


A Measurement of Wands

by oliversnape



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Coming Out, M/M, Post-War, Wands
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:49:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 53,737
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28292646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oliversnape/pseuds/oliversnape
Summary: There are a lot of broken pieces after a war, even for the victors. Sometimes they will never fit again, sometimes it takes time to heal them, and sometimes, it takes someone else to help put them back together.
Relationships: Harry Potter/Severus Snape
Comments: 119
Kudos: 304





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello again. :)

_December 18 th, 1998_

The door creaked shut behind the delivery wizard, the rain outside bouncing off the eaves of the roof and blurring the flat windows. He brought his food to the couch, the only place really accessible as a seat, and put the containers down on two boxes-turned-coffee-table. The flat had muggle lighting, though the bulbs were dim and the lack of curtains in the windows made it feel like shadows were hiding in the corners of the room. The sounds of Diagon Alley below were muted by the rain, and though it was only half seven, all he wanted to do was find a blanket and curl up to sleep on the couch. He told himself that it was from a long day of moving from the muggle world back to the wizarding one, but the meagre number of boxes in the room cast doubt to that source. He picked up his wand ( _oh, to the foolish boy who loves his sticks…)_ and flicked it toward the fireplace, adding more heat to the room. December in London would never be free of a damp chill, and his right arm was aching.

He’d brought a muggle tv with him in the hopes that living on the edge of Diagon Alley would be enough to still get some muggle shows, and he was pleased to find that true. Trash telly, but there was a sort of comfort in wrapping himself in a blanket, eating takeaway, and watching people argue over meaningless things. He glanced around the room at the moving boxes, his first _Daily Prophet_ in months on the floor in front of him, and an unopened embossed letter from the Department of Magical Law Enforcement - Auror Division.

The _Prophet_ flashed at him, unknown Ministry spokesperson at a podium, under the headline _Massacre of Godric’s Hollow a year later – the still-unknowns_.

Out of the corner of his eye, one of the boxes by the kitchen started to rattle a bit. He debated whether to get up or not – he’d packed the boxes himself and so there shouldn’t have been any sort of living thing in it – but he’d not been the only one to move the boxes.

The flaps burst open a second later and some streamers flew out, followed by a chorus of out of tune recorders. A shiny red balloon with the words _Welcome Back_ then rose out of the box, with a small bundle of what looked to be several different types of treats from Honeydukes.

He was from a world of magic, from a world of small little moments of happiness and giant explosions of destruction and creation. He’d missed it greatly.

“Welcome home, Harry,” he told himself, with a tiny smile.

……

The rain turned into a light snow overnight, and in the morning, Harry fought with himself before getting up from his bed. Seven months after the war, and it still felt odd not to have a set schedule for his days. He made his way over to the kettle in the kitchen and yawned, wondering if he had enough food for breakfast or if that stop needed to be added to his errand list. There were a few small market shops, but whether Harry ended up with Owl‘Os or Cheerios would depend on how the day went and whether he wanted to shop amongst wizards or muggles. 

He flexed his fingers whilst waiting for tea, debating whether he’d need any pain potion, or if taking along a small phial for later would be good enough. 

Diagon Alley had flourished quite a bit in the last few months since Harry had seen it. Whilst most of the actual war and battle had taken place at Hogwarts, stores had still been shuttered and facing destruction from snatchers during the past year, and had started to make a recovery over the summer. Harry had missed most of it, but he was happy to see that the ice cream shop had new owners, Madame Malkin’s was open and busy on the chilly day, and Harry was pleased to see a group of young witches and wizards peering through the window at Quality Quidditch Supplies. He was also aware of the furtive glances and stares from other shoppers in the alley, eyes flicking up to where his fringe covered the scar as they passed by.

He made his way to the farther end of the alley, side stepping the morning crowd at Gringotts and giving a glance down to Knockturn Alley as he stepped past. Finally, he found the door he was looking for; the front stone step worn from centuries of people entering.

“I had heard you’d returned.”

Harry closed the door behind him and waited as his eyes adjusted to the dimmer light inside. 

“I hadn’t fully left,” Harry replied.

Ollivander peered at him from behind the first aisle of wands, hair wild as ever but looking in good health otherwise. He was wearing a leather apron and Harry could see the handles of carving tools sticking out from the various pockets of the apron. The shop counter was neat and tidy, mid-December not being its busiest time, and behind the counter on Ollivander’s desk, Harry saw a thin and delicate wand slowly rotating in the light above a work mat.

“I don’t believe one ever fully stops being a wizard,” Ollivander said. He nodded toward a stool that was on the other side of the counter top and sat down on his own. “But I don’t suppose you’re here to speak of sabbaticals.”

“Not exactly,” Harry said, taking a seat. Through the corner of his eye he saw a person pause as they walked by the shop, recognising Harry through the window. He knew it was something he was going to have to get used to again.

“I wanted to thank you for your information, just before the battle,” Harry started. Ollivander floated a tea tray over to the countertop between them, and Harry waited as a cup was poured for him. “Just milk.”

“It was correct,” Ollivander said, eyes sharp. “You did have the Elder wand.”

Harry made a note to himself to find out just what of his speech to Voldemort had been recorded and shared to everyone. He had a pensieve memory of it, but it felt like another lifetime ago.

“Voldemort did,” Harry carefully replied. He loosened his scarf a little, feeling the warmth from the shop finally seep into his skin. “More importantly, Voldemort believed in it, and it backfired.”

“It doesn’t matter what he believed,” Ollivander said. “You are the master of the Elder wand.”

He was staring at Harry, his look calculating and Harry knew that he was reviewing every bit of information about the Elder wand that he knew.

“I was,” Harry conceded. “The wand is now back with who it was stolen from.”

He was careful not to say that the original owner was dead. Ollivander may not have known about the Hallows, but he was very familiar with wand ownership and Harry didn’t want someone trying to overpower him for the Elder wand.

“You told me that wands can be won, that their allegiance can be changed,” Harry prompted, remembering how terrified Ollivander had been the last time he asked about wand allegiances.

“Yes,” came the answer, as Ollivander sipped his tea. “Some are easier won than others. It depends on the wood and the core, and how they are taken.”

“And that wood, it is very important that it matches the personality of the holder,” Harry prompted.

“The performance will be poor if it doesn’t,” Ollivander immediately said. “This is why the wand chooses the wizard, Mr Potter, and not the other way around.”

“Right,” Harry said, putting his cup down. “But people have tried to pick their favourites before.”

“Never successfully in this shop,” Ollivander said, looking rather affronted. “I pride myself in making the best match for a witch or wizard, to ensure they have years of good service.”

“Years of service,” Harry repeated. “Wands can be broken, wands can be stolen, wands can be won. How often do they simply stop working well for people?”

“All wands will produce magic,” Ollivander said. “It is rare that a wand will simply stop working so well.”

“But they do,” Harry said. He pulled a wand out of his pocket, one he didn’t use anymore, but had kept for a reason he wasn’t even quite sure of. “This one is hawthorn, a wood that is best suited for people who are uncertain, or going through turmoil.”

“You’ve been studying,” Ollivander said, though he didn’t sound negative about it. Instead, he was staring at the wand as he was remembering who he’d sold it to.

“And it worked for me when I used it. Very much so. But got less and less powerful after the battle.”

“That is what I would expect, yes,” Ollivander said, eyebrow slightly raised. He offered nothing more, and Harry knew that Ollivander’s business relied on the fact that people broke wands, needed replacement wands, or just wanted them in general. There was no way he could survive on first year wand buyers only.

“And because my old wand was broken —”

“Snapped in two, held by the barest trace of phoenix feather, if I remember correctly,” Ollivander interrupted.

Harry had only shown him the broken wand once, in the small dark bedroom at Shell Cottage, but he was not surprised that Ollivander remembered it.

“—I would have to either make do with this one, or buy another.”

“Yes, that is correct. One that would be best suited to your skills and personality at this time.”

Harry drained his tea cup and nodded.

“Are wand repairs possible? My friend Ron, he had a broken wand in second year and sellotaped it together. Didn’t work very well though.”

“In general, no.” He offered more tea to Harry and filled his own cup. “Why do you ask, Mr Potter? Do you have another broken wand?”

“No,” Harry said. He moved Draco’s old wand aside and then withdrew his own from his pocket, placing it on the counter in front of them. Ollivander’s attention was solely on the wand. 

“This is what I mean. I never wanted a new wand. I’ve had this one since my second day of being a wizard.”

“But how...” Ollivander murmured, and Harry was fairly certain he was talking to the wand and not to Harry.

“Elder is a very powerful wand wood,” Harry said, watching as Ollivander rolled his wand with a quill. There was no sign of breakage, as Harry knew there wouldn’t be. Just a small fleck of black walnut that had been added to the top of the handle. “Even before it is turned into the most powerful wand.”

This broke Ollivander’s concentration, and he regarded Harry with the sort of fierce interest that made Harry uncomfortable when he’d first been speaking of the power that Voldemort would command with his wand.

“I destroyed it,” Harry lied. “No one needs that power.”

“No indeed,” Ollivander agreed, and in an instant the flash of greed and desire that Harry had seen had vanished.

“But to your point, Mr Potter, when their wands stop working properly, witches and wizards will purchase a new one that suits them best. Most do not have the same attachment with their childhood wands.”

Harry found that curious but didn’t ask if Ollivander had ever upgraded his own. He pocketed his wand again and placed his tea cup back on the tray.

“Thanks for the tea,” Harry said, rising out of his stool. “And thanks for the information. Wandlore isn’t taught at Hogwarts.”

“It is not a subject that most young wizards and witches find themselves interested in,” Ollivander admitted. 

“Or in need of the knowledge for their own survival,” Harry replied, with a small smile that was more for himself than Ollivander. 

……

With his scarf bundled up past his nose, Harry next stepped into Slug and Jiggers. There was a small amount of slush at the door, and he quickly moved aside to allow a witch carrying three cauldrons to leave. His glasses had immediately fogged up, and Harry grumbled at himself for not using a spell to prevent it.

“Thank you, Mr Potter,” an older wizard said as Harry shuffled by the tiny aisles to where the dragon parts were kept. Harry’s cheeks flushed; he still felt embarrassed whenever someone approached him. He’d settled for only nodding, and pulled his collar up as he browsed the jars of dragon ingredients. In the beginning, before he’d left for a while, Harry used to disguise himself as a Weasley when he went out. 

He heard the ding of the bell over the door chime shortly after and ignored it, in favour of digging through the jar of slimy red heartstrings. He wanted one with as few fractures and tendrils as possible, a strong opaque string that wasn’t going to disintegrate on touch. 

“Two bundles of dandelion root and one phoenix claw.”

Harry’s hand stilled, holding the end of one string half way out of the jar. 

“And a jar of wartcap powder.”

Harry dropped the heartstring into his own collection jar and peered around the corner at the front desk. Snape looked much like he ever did at first glance, but his hair was a bit shorter and looked a bit healthier, and his clothes, though still black, appeared to have been fashionable sometime within the last 75 years.

“Will that be all?” the clerk asked, wrapping up Snape’s purchases. “Three galleons, six and four.”

Harry watched as Snape counted out the galleons, sickles and knuts, neither rushing nor stalling as he did so. His left hand was deliberate and practiced as he stacked the coins. Snape’s survival in the war had been a mystery to most of the wizarding world; the real story of how he’d done it had never come out. Harry had never shared it, though an unspoken pact. Snape had also made the paper after slipping out of St Mungo’s unnoticed one day. And here he was, on a cold December morning in Diagon Alley, buying potion ingredients as if nothing had gone on. Harry hadn’t prepared himself to see Snape so quickly after coming back.

Harry frowned to himself and turned back to his own list of needed supplies. Images whipped through his mind like a storm, of nearly a year beforehand, of a dark and cold night in the middle of Dartmoor. Of blood and scars, skin and fiery nerves. Harry’s hand stilled on a jar of cleaning solution, eyes closed and willing away the sense of panic and the smell of burning forest. The footfalls behind him were still recognisable, and Harry turned as Snape approached. Up close, Snape’s eyes were a licoricey black, steady as they locked on Harry.

The inspection went both ways, and Harry felt himself straighten up under scrutiny. Snape’s eyes flicked toward the heartstring Harry held, curiosity evident.

“Potter,” Snape finally said, giving a small nod. He looked like he wanted to say something else, but settled for Harry’s name and nothing more.

He then brushed past Harry, exiting the shop without any of the flourish he used to swoop about the school with. Harry’s gaze narrowed as he watched Snape go.

“Bloody hell,” Harry muttered. He quickly paid for his ingredients and threw his cloak hood up, stomping out into the slushy snow and toward The Leaky Cauldron. 

……

He sat at a table in the rafters of the Leaky, mug of hot chocolate in his hand with an obscene number of marshmallows in it and leftover _Prophet_ folded in front of him. Harry had purposefully chosen a table in the shadows, away from the downstairs noise and passage to the Alley, and yet an owl had still found him there. A garishly brightly coloured envelope, from the _Daily Prophet_ , a request for an exclusive interview with him for the paper. Harry burned the letter over the candle at his table, more than a little annoyed that they’d known he was back already.

He’d spent six months in the muggle world figuring out who he was after the war and his experiences, and didn’t feel like he owed that personal introspection to anyone, most assuredly not a newspaper that had had no qualms about dragging him through the mud as a minor.

He didn’t want to think what they would make of Harry Potter as an adult. Their illusion of him as a boy next door hero was laughable now, but as a student, was an intimidating label to live up to.

A shrieking from below interrupted his maudlin thoughts and Harry looked through the wonky balcony railing to spot a gaggle of witches who’d entered the Leaky. They were carrying various shopping bags, each had a broomstick in hand, and they appeared to be having a rowdy conversation with copious laughter. Shouts of hello were made to Tom the bartender, and one by one they passed through the back gate to the Alley entrance.

The normal hum of the Leaky soon blanketed the room again, and the clinking of silverware from the bar below sounded almost like Christmas bells to Harry.

A much different Christmas than the year before, Harry thought, remembering the church bells of the cemetery in Godric’s Hollow. A snowy evening, likely more snow in memory than there had been in actuality, and a crisp tenseness in the air to go with the harsh voices in conversation over the Potter gravestone. 

A rumbling muggle train passing by close to the other side of the wall brought Harry out of his musings, and he finished his hot chocolate. The wizarding world had brought Harry his first happy Christmas seven years earlier, and he had a quiet hope that it would happen again this year.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, what a great welcome back! I don't know how often I'll be updating, maybe once a week or so. But I appreciate all the notes and hellos, and I hope you all had a wonderful holiday. I should note that for my stories I don't consider the cursed child or any of the video games to be canon, so anything related to those that appear is purely accidental.

_December 19 th, 1998_

The rain outside clattered against the windows, in competition with the tin kettle’s lid rattling as it came to a boil on the stove. Though it was just gone 6 and people could be heard shouting and closing up shops in the street below, it was dark and unfriendly outside. He could see lights dancing in the rain though the windows as he made the tea, first the soft glow of candle light, an incandescent from the wizard to muggle street progression, and then the harsher blue lights of the City of London in the far distance.

Harry rolled his shoulders and reached for the biscuit tin on the counter, that he kept his tea bags in. The rain looked like it wouldn’t take much to turn into a wet snow, and he flipped through the takeaway menus clipped to the inside of the kitchen cupboard door. 

“Fred?” Harry called, reading through the list of Indian curries. “Fred, see if George wants Indian.”

“Hold a minute, sir,” came Fred’s smart reply, mimicking an operator.

Harry pulled his wallet out from his pocket and checked how many muggle notes he had in there. 

“His highness is agreeable to the request and says ‘surprise me’,” Fred replied. “He says he’s on time for seven.”

“Great, thanks, Fred,” Harry said. “Sorry for using you as a messenger again.”

Fred gave him a smile and a two-fingered salute and wandered off.

Harry sent his order with Kreacher, who was particularly skilled at fetching orders without Muggles realising what he was. Harry took his tea and walked back to his desk at the other side of the flat, sitting back in his desk chair and surveying the work he’d done earlier that afternoon with a quiet satisfaction.

The back of the desk had apothecary drawers but instead of being filled by potion ingredients, they held several different slivers, blocks, vines, and sticks of wood. The drawers on the left side held lengths of unicorn hair, phoenix feathers, and dragon heartstring; tagged by type of dragon, age of unicorn, and name of phoenix. Lined up on his right, under the base of an oil lamp, were small hand carving tools of various shapes and sharpness. Two broken pieces of a wand lay on a leather mat in the middle of the desk, a thin sliver of unicorn hair connecting them. 

As he drank the tea, Harry wiggled his fingers and the leaves of a small tree in a jar on his desk waved back. The muggle world had been a relaxing break from fame and war, but he’d missed being able to do magic whenever he wanted.

He glanced up to a small corkboard that he’d placed above the desk, which had wand notes and design sketches pinned to it, and in the middle a note reminding him to see Alice on Monday. In the corner of the board was a small recipe card with watery ring marks obscuring some of the text. It detailed most of the steps for making Draught of Living Death, but one line was missing, and though Harry checked semi-frequently, it hadn’t filled itself in in months.

……

“Nothing like a good curry to warm up the insides,” George said, a satisfied look on his face as he sat back against Harry’s couch.

“Are you sweating, Harry?” Fred joked, squinting at him. “It can’t be that hot, can it?”

Harry wiped his face with the blanket that was on his lap and grinned. 

“Sometimes Kreacher likes to mess with the spice levels,” Harry admitted. He’d only managed to eat half of his curry, but the rest would do for lunch leftovers.

“Well,” said George, “It was bloody good and it’s our treat. You’re doing a favour after all.”

“No really,” Harry said, shaking his head. “You two are like brothers, there’s no charge.”

“You can tell Harry’s never had brothers, Georgie,” Fred said.

“Cos then he’d charge us double,” George replied, sporting an identical grin to his brother.

“I can do that if you want,” Harry said, putting his bowl down and relaxing into his chair. His sitting room wasn’t that chilly despite the rainy night, and the firelight mixed with the low muggle lightning made the flat feel fairly cosy. 

“Far too late for that,” George said, though he’d lost some of his joking tone. He took his wand out of his pocket and held it loosely between his hands, the honey wood colour shining warmly in the light. 

“It’s not broken; there’s no damage to the wand itself. But I can feel it isn’t right.”

Harry nodded, holding his hand out for the wand.

“What is it made of?” Harry held it up to the light and ran his hands over all the grooves and knicks of the wood.

“Dogwood,” Fred answered, as the matching wand was placed on the coffee table.

“With dragon heartstring,” George followed up. “Took a while to get the wands working just right, but once they got to know us…”

“And now what does it do?” Harry asked, holding up his hand as a measuring tape came flying at him from the desk.

“Well, it still works, but it does magic half-heartedly. Cleaning spells don’t work right, and at the shop, well. The explosions aren’t the same.”

“Only you would complain of that,” Harry smiled. He put the wand back on the table and scratched his chin. Harry then stood and walked over to his desk, searching through the drawers until he withdrew a small block of light yellowheart wood, caressing his nail through the visible tree rings. 

“I have some ideas,” Harry finally said. “I think I’ll need two or three days. Then you can come back and we’ll try it.”

“Thanks, mate,” George said. “Suppose there’s been a few of these requests.”

“Some,” Harry admitted. “But this is more of a hobby than anything, I can’t guarantee it’ll work. Ollivander usually suggests people–”

“–Get a new wand,” Fred said. 

“Right,” Harry nodded. “But I didn’t want a new one when mine broke. And I thought others wouldn’t either. Maybe. I’ve only done six, disguised as someone else.”

Harry’s voice trailed off and he shook his head. “He’s a bit peculiar, Ollivander, but he did share important wand knowledge when I needed it.”

George stretched as he stood, rubbing his tired eyes a bit. It was only half nine, but Harry suspected the Burrow still wasn’t quite back to normality yet.

“You add some wood to make it match the person?”

“Or a different core, something. Normally I ask what the person went through,” Harry said. He’d stood as well, and had picked up both wands from the table. “It was mad then. I don’t really know what happened to most people. Not at the battle, not in the months before,” Harry admitted.

“And you won’t tell us what you went through either,” George pointed out, nodding toward Harry’s right arm.

Harry gave a small smile in acknowledgement.

“It’s hard to see what will fix things right away. Sometimes I can see when people do magic, or they tell me themselves, what has changed. _The wood is standoffish, it fights me, it’s cold, it is not the warm comfort it was_ , that sort of thing,” he continued.

Harry turned the two wands over in his hands. 

“And sometimes they tell me that they haven’t changed, but rather that they’re no longer whole.”

He looked up at the twins once more.

“I just need a day or so. You can take the loaner wand until then. It takes time to join the cores together, but I think that will do it.”

George picked up the portrait of Fred and held it against his chest, hugging it. 

“Thanks, Harry.”

……

The skies cleared overnight, dropping the temperature further, and the morning felt crisp and fresh. Harry woke in a calm mood, his arm not hurting as much now that the storm had passed. He’d managed to unpack most of his flat the night before, and had used an almost excessive amount of magic to do what he had. He made his way over to the kettle in the kitchen and yawned whilst it boiled, forgetting that he could have used magic to instantly boil it. He was surprised to find two owls at the kitchen window, as the deluge of post-war post and accolades had ceased quite quickly as it became abundantly clear that Harry wasn’t going to answer any of it. One letter was from Hagrid, inviting him to afternoon tea, and the other was from the Ministry of Magic.

Harry smiled, pleased with the tea invite though a little reserved about returning to Hogwarts. The Ministry letter he ignored completely, not wanting to deal with the Ministry just yet. Feeling a bit cheerier, Harry took his tea back to the bedroom at the back of his flat. He moved his snitch and table lamp from the makeshift bedside table and popped open the box, digging through the t-shirt wrapped items until he found what he was looking for. It’d only been packed for a month, but Harry still wiped it off and held it up to the light. A small piece of pink fabric, and a chipped bit of wood, in a tiny frame. He put the lamp and snitch back on the box, and went back to the sitting room, surveying the walls. They were old, crooked, and a little bumpy, but Harry found a good spot between the two large windows in the front room, above his desk. A quick sticking spell and the frame was up, on display and a reminder of the first wand he had fixed for a friend.

Satisfied, Harry sat down at his desk and picked up George’s wand, a friendly feeling transferring to his palm as he held it. The wand’s energy seemed muted, missing something, and Harry flipped his notebook open and started reading his wood comparison chart. He had Fred’s wand as well that he’d planned to extract part of the core from to join with George’s, but also wanted to see if there was a wand wood that would help with the transition.

……

Hogwarts loomed and looked ever so impressive in the snow. The sun had come out, and the grounds absolutely glittered as Harry passed through the gates. He gave a small glance up to Gryffindor tower and grinned to himself. It wasn’t visible from the grounds – never would be – but Harry knew that just up under the window that was between his and Ron’s bunk were two little carved figures - a shorter one with wild dark hair, and a taller ginger one. He’d been sad not to come back for his final seventh year, but there’d only been some grumblings of a returning eighth year of students. The general consensus was that they’d be too old mentally, which Harry thought was both true and also an oversimplicity. They’d all gone through war in the end, though he supposed the ones that had actually fought wouldn’t have much patience for transfiguration quizzes any longer.

He certainly hadn’t.

Harry approached Hagrid’s hut and felt his peaceful mood grow as he took in the new and yet familiar looking home. The windows had a brilliance to them that distracted from the scorch marks on the brick, and they overlooked a widened garden and a large paddock that held several bored-looking alpaca-like creatures. The door burst open before Harry could knock and Fang rushed at him, barking happily.

“Fang!” Hagrid called. “Get back in here ye big brute.”

“Hi Hagrid,” Harry replied, giving Fang pets on the back of his head. He followed the overly enthusiastic dog into the hut and watched with amusement as Hagrid floated teacups and a giant teapot that could double as a child’s bath toward the table. 

“Warm enough for ye?” Hagrid asked, pointing his wand at the fire and beefing up the flames.

“It’s working well then?” Harry asked, as he dropped his coat on the back of his chair.

“Like the day I got it,” Hagrid beamed. He held his wand up to admire it, and Harry sat to take hold of his cup of tea and warm his hands. 16 inches, oak wood, he remembered. With a slight pink ribboning throughout. Hagrid’s wand was extremely powerful, Harry had found, likely why it had continued to slightly work after being broken.

“I’m glad,” Harry said. “It should have been done a long time ago. I’m surprised Dumbledore hadn’t pushed for your pardon.”

“Ah, Dumbledore had bigger things going on to handle,” Hagrid interrupted. “I have it now, and that’s what matters.”

“I suppose,” Harry said. He took a big sip of tea and sat back in the chair, relaxed. He’d been excited about coming to see Hagrid, to break up his day, but didn’t know what to talk about now.

“How’s the new place?” Hagrid asked. “You could have come here, you know. Plenty o’space for a quidditch coach.”

“It’s all right,” Harry said, patting Fang on the top of his head. “Not sure I could come back here though. Feels like I grew out of this place already.”

“We all need a break sometimes,” Hagrid nodded. “I’ve never been much in the muggle world, of course…”

“It’s very safe,” Harry said. He dug through the box of shortbread that he had brought for them. “In a very boring sort of way.”

Hagrid looked a bit flummoxed at that, and Harry considered that Hagrid was the sort that thought fire-breathing dragons were cute. 

Before Harry could explain any further though there was a sharp knock at the door. It clearly wasn’t a threat, as Fang had barely raised his head, but Harry’s hand drifted down to his side, where he could grab his wand easier.

Hagrid, meanwhile, threw open the door without a care for the fact that it was December and bloody chilly out.

“Professor!”

McGonagall was dressed in an ornately embroidered cloak, the sharp points on her shoulders covered by a small dusting of snow.

“Hagrid, apologies, I did not know that you had company.”

Her voice was an odd mixture of warm and yet strong, and a smile grew on her face when she saw Harry. 

“Oh, it’s all right, Professor. We’re just having tea, always room for one more,” Hagrid said. He’d closed the door, and with his giant presence Harry felt like the hut was perhaps a little too small for the three of them.

“Well,” she said, before unclasping her cloak. “It would be nice to have a cup and a chat.”

Harry scooted his chair over a bit to make room for McGonagall, grasping his mug carefully so none of the tea sloshed out. His right hand had started to ache again but Harry was used to it and slyly pulled the cuff of his sleeve down to hide the scarring on his hand.

“Mr Potter, I trust your return to the wizarding world has been uneventful.”

It was more of a statement than a question, and Harry thought for a second before shrugging.

“There’s less violence,” Harry finally said. 

“I suppose that’s a start,” McGonagall said, though Harry could tell from her pursed lips that his answer wasn’t quite the one she was hoping for. 

“I’ve not been back long,” Harry explained further. “People still look at me like they are waiting to see what I’m going to do next.”

“Will you go for the Ministry?” Hagrid bluntly asked. “Never really saw ye as a Ministry man meself.”

“I don’t think so,” Harry said, glancing at McGonagall again. “Though I appreciate your help with the OWLs for being an auror.”

McGonagall nodded. Harry suspected she understood his desire not to be an auror any longer.

“You’ve yet to receive your NEWTS, however,” McGonagall told him. “I dearly hope you plan to study for them.”

“I’ve always studied for exams,” Harry replied, with a sly grin.

“See that you do,” she told him, holding her cup to her lips. “I’m sure you would find employment without issue, but best to have things done properly.”

“I have a new project already,” Harry pointed out. He pushed the box of shortbread he’d brought toward her, thankful that Hagrid had stuck with serving those and not his homemade rock cakes. “I’m reworking George Weasley’s wand, since it hasn’t been working well for him since....”

Hagrid’s expression faltered and Harry felt a twang of uneasiness. No one knew how to talk about the twins now, and everyone seemed to dance around the topic.

“Wasn’t sure if he’d be needing it,” Hagrid finally said. “The fixin’.”

“They put on a brave face,” Harry mused. “You know, they’ve even started pranking people with George’s portrait. They had a number of portraits made, and they’ve been stashing them places.”

Harry took a large bite of shortbread and washed it down with tea. McGonagall had a melancholic look and glanced at the snow out the window.

“Mrs Weasley doesn’t like to think about it. Them planning for one of them to die. But I reckon there’s just as many portraits of George somewhere. They always liked to think ahead.” 

“They did,” Hagrid agreed, letting out a heavy breath. “Gave me a portrait before they left Hogwarts, you know.”

Harry and McGonagall followed Hagrid’s gaze to where the portrait was, on a side table with some other photos and paintings. He was completely unsurprised to see that it was just George in the painting, and that there was a large empty spot where Fred would have been.

The mood in the hut had turned sombre, but not uncomfortably so.

“Now that it’s over and we can look back,” McGonagall started, “it was too much that we asked of you at such a young age. Of all of you.”

“It had to be done,” Harry said, shrugging. He’d made peace with being the chosen one years ago, though sometimes still kept himself up at nights feeling guilty for his friends getting hurt trying to help him.

“It is something we need to teach, to learn from,” McGonagall continued. Hagrid nodded.

“Teach the wars, the lessons, the behaviours. We need to prevent this from happening again.”

Harry wasn’t sure what she was looking for in response, so he kept silent.

“It is almost the anniversary of the Massacre of Godric’s Hollow,” she finished, trailing off in thought. 

“I saw that in the paper yesterday,” Harry carefully acknowledged.

McGonagall stared at him. “And the Burning of Dartmoor next month – it is difficult to teach of an event about which no one knows the exact details, you know.”

“I can’t help you,” Harry calmly said, staring back. After a moment, she nodded very slightly and her lips twitched.

“Severus says the same thing.”

“I’m sure not as politely,” Harry pointed out, amused. He stood and used magic to send his mug along to the sink. “Thank you for the tea and the chat.”

“Severus also runs away after I mention the Massacre and the Burning,” McGonagall said over the top of her teacup, and this time she was smiling.

Harry smirked and flicked his cloak over his shoulders.

“Tastefully exiting. Good bye professor, bye Hagrid.”

……

_Godric’s Hollow, December 24th 1997_

There was enough snow on the ground to showcase a picture-perfect village Christmas Eve, though the unusually cold night meant that most were staying indoors and the streets were deserted. Harry felt unnerved, exposed in the open, and he could tell that Hermione felt similarly. The church bells rang out as they entered the cemetery, echoing toward the village square. Harry couldn’t help glancing around with nearly every step they took. 

It took a while to find the Potter’s grave, and Harry felt a flash of jealousy upon finding it occupied, even though he knew they wouldn’t be alone. The snow had been wiped from the front of the stone, and a small candle had been placed on top of it.   
  
“We got your message,” Harry said, keeping his distance from Snape. He still hadn’t fully decided how much he trusted Snape yet, and he knew that Hermione had her reservations as well.

“You wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t,” Snape said. His voice sounded worn, but his eyes were sharp and his movements quick as he monitored the cemetery around them. Dressed in his regular teaching robes, Harry thought he looked like the same as he ever was, but thinner.

“Why should we trust you?” Hermione asked, her wand drawn. Snape may have been their professor once, but after months of hiding, defence was all they thought about. 

“Potter knows why,” Snape snapped. He looked like he was going to say something else, but stopped.

“We aren’t staying long,” Harry bluntly said, accepting Snape’s statement. “Dumbledore was very clear on what the next steps were.”

“I am not here on any request or planning by Albus Dumbledore,” Snape said, sounding cross. “Your friends are being tortured, Potter. You must move faster to end this war.”

“It’s not exactly easy, Snape. I can’t just call him for a duel to end everything,” Harry argued back.

“You probably could,” Hermione said, considering. “But we’re not ready for that.”

“I am aware,” Snape said. He didn’t look at Hermione at all, but instead was focused solely on Harry. He was, for Snape, being fairly polite to her at least, Harry thought.

“How? You don’t know what we’re looking for,” Harry said, certain that Dumbledore hadn’t shared the horcrux information with Snape.

“Don’t I?” Snape asked. “I don’t need to be told to see the evidence and put together the hints.”

He looked grumpy and cold, like he’d had a long several months of no sleep and constant vigilance.

“Fine. Any bits of information that would help hurry things along then?”

Snape said nothing and Harry nodded.

“Right. So, continue on as is.”

“Hogwarts is no longer safe,” Snape said. He stood straight and then sighed a little, as if the venom he’d carried through the years of Harry’s time at Hogwarts was running low. Finally, he nodded at the cheap looking candle he’d placed on the gravestone.

“That is not a candle. Use it wisely, and apparate before it lands.”

Both Harry and Hermione’s faces schooled into a confused expression, but Harry shortly realised that Snape meant he’d have to throw whatever was in the glass at his attackers. Or at a horcrux.

Harry looked at it, at the red wax melting around what looked to be a glass phial. He reached down under Snape’s watchful eye, his fingers grazing the top of the gravestone. A crackling sound snapped across the air above them and Harry spun around, steadying himself against the gravestone with his hand. Black shadows burst into form around them, death eaters appearing exactly as they had done in fourth year.

“Hello, Potter. So glad you finally came to pay respects.”

“HARRY!”


	3. Chapter 3

_December 20th, 1998._

“Harry!”

Harry blinked awake on the couch, sitting up slowly in confusion. The voice was not in his flat, but rather in his fireplace. Hermione looked concerned, but Harry gave a great big stretch as he sat up.

“Sorry,” Harry said.

“You were shouting in your sleep,” she told him. He could tell she was looking around the room behind him for signs of danger, but there was only an empty takeaway carton on the table and a block of sapele, that was sitting on a pile of letters and bills that Harry was putting off opening.

“Don’t we all?” Harry asked. He rubbed his eyes a bit and stood up, dropping the blanket back to the couch. She gave him a sympathetic look, and Harry turned away, promising to be there shortly.  
  


……

  
Ron and Hermione’s flat was on the other end of the alley, beyond Gringotts’s and above a textile shop. Harry zipped through the street fairly quickly, keeping his head down and his cloak hood up. He’d thought of offering them Grimmauld’s Place, back in the summer when Ron had had enough of the Burrow and wanted to leave, but decided against. It was a giant house for just two people – Sirius had trouble there as a single person – and Harry figured the memories there were a little too sharp and unwanted still.

Their door felt warm as he knocked on it, and it was barely a second before it flung open and Harry was drawn in to a cosy and bright flat. Hermione called hello at him from the sitting room, and Ron was in the kitchen, finishing off dinner. Harry kicked off his shoes and went to the kitchen to chat with Ron.

“Did you hear Cho had her baby?” Ron asked, leaning against the counter with a butterbeer bottle. “Bit early, Mum says, but doing well.”

Harry looked around the kitchen for a bottle opener before remembering he was a wizard and using his wand to pop the cap off.

“I didn’t even know she was pregnant,” Harry said.

“Yeah,” Ron replied. He’d turned back to the stove and was stirring the sauce in the pan.

“She and Terry Boot, it seems,” Ron said, taking a tester bite. “Celebrated a bit too hard after we won. You won.”

“We,” Harry corrected. “Huh. Nice that life is starting again after the war.”

“Ginny says there will be more,” Ron added, with a grin. “Mum nearly had a heart attack when she said it, and I’ve never seen Neville go so white.”

“Oh no,” Harry laughed. Hermione came into the kitchen and brought plates out of the cupboard, smiling at Ron’s story.

“Oh yeah,” Ron nodded. “Then when she was assured that Ginny wasn’t going to be having a baby, she turned her attention on us. For years we’ve been worried about losing our lives, now mum’s worried we’ll make a new one.”

“She probably wants you to wait a few years, that’s all,” Harry said. “They still think we’re kids.”

Ron made a face at that, but Hermione nodded.

“I think most of the parents had trouble transitioning between having nearly-grown children and then adults who fought in the war.”

Harry didn’t have an answer for that, but knew Hermione was right. He’d continued to have Sunday dinners at the Burrow since the end of the war, and it was always a grab bag on how Molly Weasley would be. Some dinners she’d treat them like the adults they were, and sometimes she was feeling a bit off and mothered them a bit more than was really necessary.

“Guess you don’t have to worry about little accidents anyway,” Ron finally said. He’d started putting food on the plates and Harry was impressed at how good it looked.

“Nah, not really,” Harry said. “I’m careful anyway, for other reasons.”

He tore the label from his butterbeer and meticulously folded it. Ron, who knew him like a brother, wasn’t fooled or uncomfortable about the silence.

“Have you seen Luke lately?” Ron asked, no trace of teasing in his voice.

Harry shook his head, looking around the room for the bin.

“Not since Hallowe’en.”

Hermione bumped his shoulder as she passed by to grab cutlery.

“It’s fine. I knew it would never be for very long.”

Ron had a concentrated look on his face, the same sort he had when he was figuring out a chess match. Harry fought the urge to shift under the scrutiny, and followed him to the table.

“I wanted something after the war with someone who had no idea who I was. Nothing serious.”

“I’ve been best mates with you for years, Harry. And I don’t know how you managed to beat Voldemort. You’re absolute rubbish at lying.”

He sat down in his chair and pointedly stared at Harry, sipping his beer.

“Fuck off,” Harry said, smiling. “Thanks for dinner.”

“Welcome,” Ron said, digging in. It was quiet for a bit as they all enjoyed dinner, but Harry knew that the topic of dating wasn’t over.

“Seriously though, Harry,” Hermione finally continued. “Now that you’re back, are you going to start dating again?”

Harry took his last few bites and stalled for a bit before answering. Dating in the muggle world was one thing - he was relatively anonymous and he’d been able to find someone who wasn’t looking for a serious relationship. In the wizarding world, however, he didn’t even know if gay people were accepted. He’d read the rumours about Dumbledore in Skeeter’s book, and they weren’t all together favourable.

“There’s two issues with that, Hermione,” Harry said. “Who else is gay in the wizarding world, and is it even safe to tell anyone that I am?”

“I actually looked that up,” she said, with a sheepish look. A flick of her wand conjured a small whiteboard, and she started drawing circles on it.

“You did not consult the library on Harry’s sexuality,” Ron stated. Hermione ignored him.

“I think if you look at this mathematically, your chances at finding a successful wizard to date are unfortunately rather slim,” she continued. “Or any wizard, regardless of his success.”

“What a cheery start,” Harry said, sitting back in his chair. He wasn’t quite sulking, but hadn’t come to dinner expecting a lecture.

“According to research, there are 58.5 million people in Britain. 14.5 percent of those are males between 15 and 39 years old.” She continued filling out the circles and Ron offered Harry another butterbeer.

“Of that population, then we take into the account the 200,000 witches and wizards in the UK, and narrow down to that age range. 29 thousand.”

Hermione was in full lecture mode, and though she looked like she was enjoying it, Harry crossed his arms.

“I don’t like where this is going.”

“They say about 2% of the population identify as queer, so 580. Given that the AIDS epidemic has killed a large number on the muggle side, and the low birth rate for our year and the ones before due to Voldemort’s first rise to power and... well, you really don’t have a lot of choice that are very close to your age.”

The circles she’d been drawing had been getting smaller and smaller, to the point that the final circle that overlapped all the rest looked more like a dot than a circle.

“This is a terrible pie chart, Hermione. There should at least be pie,” Ron said.

“It’s a Venn diagram, Ron. There’s no pie,” Hermione said.

“Seems like there’s no dating either,” Harry said, unsurprised and yet still disappointed.

“Well,” she sheepishly told him. “It’s not that you can’t date at all. It’s just that you might end up with someone older. Or younger of course, though that’s not technically legal, but statistically speaking. Probably someone older.”

Harry ran his finger along the scarring on his right hand, digesting what she’d said. Nothing was a surprise, except for the exact numbers, but it was interesting to know that she didn’t seem to object to him dating someone older.

“I’m thinking about it. But the _Prophet’s_ chasing me for an interview right now, and I’d rather not give them something to talk about that I can’t control.”

“It is utterly ridiculous that Rita Skeeter is still in business,” Hermione said, an annoyed look on her face. “She thinks absolutely nothing about ruining someone’s life.”

“Right, but the _Prophet_ is the only paper that people really read,” Harry said. “So, I either do their interview, or wait for someone to out me and then read their rubbish opinion.”

“Or beat them to it,” Ron said, tapping his chin. “There’s a new paper starting up at Hogwarts.”

“How do you know this?” Hermione asked.

“Ginny,” Ron shrugged. “Run by…who was it. The younger Creevey brother. Maybe you could interview with him.”

“Maybe. I’ll think about it,” Harry said. Ron grinned a bit, knowing that Harry was closing down that conversation.

“How was finishing your NEWTS?” Harry asked, in a blatant change of topic.

“Easy,” Hermione said, sounding almost disappointed. “It’s a few interviews, over a few weeks.”

“That’s it? And you have them all now?”

“Even I do,” Ron said, arm slung over the back of his chair. “Got asked all about the spells I used in the last year, given some scenarios where I’d have to use some skills and tell which ones I’d use, that sort of thing. Brewed a potion.”

“You brewed a potion,” Harry repeated with obvious disbelief.

“I know how to brew a potion, Harry,” Ron said, flinging a bean at Harry from his plate. “While you were mucking about in the muggle world, I got myself all sorted and am a graduate of Hogwarts.”

Harry grinned as he held his bottle up to his lips.

“Hermione made you, didn’t she?”

“Of course she did,” Ron laughed. Hermione looked slightly affronted, but also amused.

“It’s important, for future jobs,” Hermione said. She pushed her plate away and conjured up her familiar jar of blue flames, holding her hands around the edges to warm them.

“I don’t think anyone hiring Harry Potter is going to care much,” Ron said. He snatched a chocolate frog from the pile Harry had brought and opened it carefully. Harry watched the frog poke its head out, before making a wild jump toward the blue flames.

“Perhaps not,” Hermione admitted. “But it would be a shame not to, when it’s being offered. Besides, I think you’ll enjoy talking to McGonagall again.”

“I probably would,” Harry agreed, “but I’m not set up to interview with McGonagall.”

He’d finished his butterbeer and reached for his own chocolate frog. The fireplace was warming up the room and Harry could hear chatter below as people whizzed by Diagon Alley on broomsticks.

“Who else could do it though?” Hermione asked. “It’s not a Ministry program.”

“The only other headmaster,” Harry said. “Severus Snape.”

Ron’s eyebrows rose in surprise, and they heard a large crack from the logs in the fireplace. There was a silence at the table, no doubt as Ron and Hermione remembered the last disastrous time Harry and Snape had to work together.

“Bad luck, mate.”

……

George’s wand glowed under the lamp light in the evening. The spalted dogwood’s lines and markings intermixed with the spruce wood that Harry had added to create a pattern like a river. It was slightly thicker than it had been when George first brought it over, but Harry had replicated the shape of the original fairly well, even though the middle had been swapped.

He held it up to the light for one last look before pointing it at the coffee table.

“Reducio,” Harry said, satisfied when the table shrunk significantly. It was a little loud though, so Harry took some light sandpaper to the wand near the bottom joint of mixed woods. He had the tv on again, a silly talk show that he wasn’t really paying attention to, but that at least gave some noise in the background.

“Engorgio,” Harry tried again. The coffee table smoothly grew back to its regular size with the faintest whoosh. He smiled, and then pointed it toward the kitchen. “Accio apple.”

It came sailing through the air and made a satisfying thwack in his palm.

“George will love that,” Fred said, crossing his arms in his frame.

“I still have to have him test it,” Harry told him, switching out the light over his desk. He left the wand there, and flopped on the couch with the apple. Fred, whose portrait was on the side table, nodded.

“It’d be good to have him back to full strength again,” Fred said. “I think you’ll have more work coming your way too.”

“Yeah?” Harry asked, finishing up the apple. “How’s that? I haven’t told many people I do this. It’s just a hobby.”

Harry used his own wand to summon a blanket over, draping it across his lap and legs. 

“Ginny runs a support group at Hogwarts,” Fred explained. “She’s not announced it, of course. But there’s one or two people that, er. That aren’t themselves anymore.”

Harry felt his stomach twist a little. Of course there were others affected, he’d known this and witnessed it with the Weasleys. But he’d left the wizarding world not long after the mad month of celebrations, and missed out on life returning to normal and people coming to senses with the losses.

“Don’t look like that, Harry,” Fred said, “we knew what we were getting into. Most of us at least.”

“That’s the thing,” Harry said, glancing up at his desk and noticing the recipe card glowing slightly around the edges. “Not everyone had a choice.”

“Well, technically you didn’t either,” Fred pointed out.

Harry got up and walked back to his desk, pulling the recipe card off the board. The first line had been filled in, and said _10:20, NEWT Paperwork_. Harry picked up a quill and slowly crossed the line out, as if he’d completed the step.

“I couldn’t not do anything,” Harry said, tracing the edge of the card with his fingernail. “I’m off to bed.”

“Neither could we,” Fred said. “Don’t blame yourself too much.”

Harry offered a half smile and Fred grinned at him.

“Leave that to people who are good at it. Snape, for example. I’m sure he’ll be happy to blame you for whatever you can think of.”

“Good night, Fred,” Harry told him, flicking a curled-up wood shaving at the portrait.

….

Harry laid in bed later, naked with the blanket scrunched up beside him as his hands wandered down his chest toward his navel. The candle light flickered over his body, muscles strong, scarring from his shoulder all the way down his right arm to his fingertips, shiny in the light. Harry didn’t see it, his eyes tightly shut as he thought of another muscled body beside him, roughened fingers skimming over his skin and tracing along the v lines on his hips. Harry grabbed his cock with his left hand, pulling up so the skin covered the head and pre-cum gathered. The wank was slow and steady, a firm grip with the barest twist at the top.

He’d never been a loud person when having private time, and that hadn’t changed in his own flat.

Harry switched his grip as he sped up, cockhead slipping through the circle of his finger and thumb as he moved faster and faster, hips raised and face tilted up, remembering the feeling of long hair against his cheek. It was different; the absence of doom and danger in the background making it more relaxing and yet also more intense, evidenced by the low groan that escaped when he came.

He used magic to whisk away the remnants of the night, and pulled all the covers up to cover himself. Harry fell asleep contently, and, unnoticed in the sitting room, the crossed-out line on the recipe card disappeared.

……

The Waterstones was just busy enough that their conversation was not easily overheard, but that they weren’t crowded to the point of people bumping into them. More importantly, this one was near to both Diagon Alley and Alice’s flat.

Alice, a regular board game fiend who Harry had met in a gay bookshop back in August, had brought Battleship.

“I don’t know where you’re from,” Alice offhandedly said. “D4. I mean, you’re from England, sure enough. But you’re not really from _here_.”

“Miss,” Harry said. “Of course I’m from here.”

“Not really though,” Alice said with a smile, and didn’t explain further. A young boy, sitting at a table across from them with the remnants of a cookie on his plate, was staring. It wasn’t clear whether the boy was staring at the game of Battleship happening, or at Alice.

“H2, and stop analysing me,” Harry told her. He took a sip of his coffee, the paper cup almost a little too hot still to hold. 

Alice grimaced and gave him the finger, which Harry took to mean that his guess was a hit.

“You’re right, in any event,” Harry answered. He sat back in his chair and waited for Alice’s next guess, watching the people walk around them. “It was a good autumn away, but this isn’t really home.”

“E9,” Alice said, staring at Harry. It was a piercing stare, and Harry found it hard to meet. 

“Home’s where your bloke’s at?”

“I don’t have a bloke, Alice. Hit.” Harry rolled his eyes. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat, a flash of memory to a dark winter night nearly a year earlier, fire and damp, sweat and fear. 

“Come on, I know Lukie was just a rebound. I bet he’s weird like you,” she continued, ignoring Harry. “Mysterious, not bothered by bugs or spiders or things that go bump in the night.”

“There’s plenty of things that concern me in the dark,” Harry said, though he was fighting a smile. “H3. You make me sound like I’m a vampire.”

“No, not a vampire,” Alice immediately corrected. She followed Harry’s eyesight as a pale man in a dark cloak passed by, charcoal black hair disappearing in the collar. “Definitely an Addams.”

“If I’m an Addams, you’re Kate Winslet,” Harry said, nodding at the board. “What of H3?”

Alice sat back in the seat and crossed her arms. “You sunk my ship. Knobhead.”

Harry grinned and gave her a smug look. “Another?”

Alice checked her watch and was about to answer when a slightly inebriated office worker bumped into their table, giving Alice a disgusted look. 

“Fuckin’ freak.” 

Alice told him to fuck off as he wandered off, then slumped down into her seat.

Harry bit his lip in anger, itching to get up and confront him. It wasn’t the first time he’d been around Alice when some pillock had said something hateful, but he still didn’t know what to say to make her feel better. She’d definitely made it clear that she didn’t want him acting like her white knight either.

“Tell me about this world of yours,” Alice finally said. “Do the Addamses care if someone is an Alice, or was an Alex?”

“Not an Addams,” Harry pointed out. He looked around the room again and took a moment to continue. “I don’t know, to be honest. I don’t think so.”

“You’re not out there,” she said, and it was definitely a statement and not a question.

Harry put his pieces down and sighed.

“To my friends. That’s it.”

Alice also put her pieces down, and took another sip of her drink. She’d been a helpful friend since they’d met, introducing him to Luke and then providing an ear to listen when things didn’t work out.

“You’re working yourself up for a big reveal,” Alice said. “But you’ll always be coming out to someone. It doesn’t end in one go.”

Harry thought that was probably true for most, but also felt that because of who he was in the wizarding world, it probably would be just the one chance that he got.

“I still think it’s not going to go well,” Harry said.

“Well, just do what I do,” Alice told him. “Talk to them as if you’ve always been out and as if they’re the daft ones that have somehow forgotten.”

Harry huffed in amusement. 

“Is your man out?” she asked, finishing her drink.

“He’s not my man,” Harry reminded her. “I don’t think so though. Maybe he is. It never really came up.”

“So, you spent a bunch of time with him getting down to business, and never bothered to work that out,” she laughed. “Tale as old as time.”

“There was a major thing going on at the time that was more important,” Harry said, tossing a battleship at her.

“Uh huh,” she nodded. The clock in the café chimed for two pm, and Harry started boxing up the game. He didn’t have work to go to, but she did. Alice, who always seemed to have a good idea of when was best to drop the conversation, didn’t continue along that line. She helped pack up the game and fished around in her purse.

“Do you have money for the tube? I’m short.”

Harry frowned as he pulled stuff out of his pockets. He had a few sickles, and a 50p coin, a quill nib, a few very short strands of unicorn hair, and two ice mice wrappers.

Alice blinked at the lot and took the 50p.

“Dragon coins, silver threads, and weird mouse wrappers. Say hi to Uncle Fester for me.”

……

_December 24th, 1997_

Hermione’s yell of his name had barely finished before Harry snatched the candle off of the gravestone. The black swaths kept coming, landing in a semi-circle around them, and he knew that Snape still stood beside him, disguised to look like a confused muggle. 

“You see,” an arrogant and silky voice said, “it’s not just the Dark Lord’s name that tracks your location. One touch of a stone, and here we are.”

Lucius Malfoy had not bothered to wear his mask, either because of fashion reasons or because he thought this would be the end of Harry and he wanted Harry to see him make good on his threat from five years earlier.

“The pub,” Harry said instead, tossing the candle up in the air. Hermione disappeared in an instant, and in the second of distraction from his answer and the flying candle, Harry spun round, grabbed Snape, and disapparated.

They landed in a small room, dark and cold, wide wooden floorboards with white walls. It was the safe house Harry had prepared for, though Snape was a wild card.

Hermione, as expected, had gone somewhere else.

“What did I just throw, and why are my fingers burning,” Harry barked, struggling to get his jacket off.

Snape, who had pushed himself away from Harry immediately upon landing, was also staring at his own arm with a stricken look on his face.

“Did you touch the stone with your hand?” Snape demanded, yanking the buttons off his cloak as he tried to get the fabric off of his right arm. Harry saw that the gloves Snape had thrown to the floor had holes in the fingertips.

“No? Yes, I don’t...I can’t remember.”

Harry had conjured a bucket of cold water and shoved his hand in, but the burning persisted and he felt like his nerves were on fire.

“It was vapour poison,” Snape distractedly said. “It stole all the oxygen in a thirty-foot radius.” He bumped up next to Harry and shoved his own arm in the cold water, the other still holding his wand. Snape began murmuring in Latin under his breath, and Harry recognised that this was not according to plan, and that they were in trouble. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finding the wizarding population isn't an exact science; this is my best guess.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updates will take a bit longer now, back at work after the holidays. Please watch for the dates at the beginning of sections for the timeline, the month is the same but the years are not. Thank you for all of the comments and reviews; they are wonderful to read. :)

_December 22, 1998_

Harry stretched and winced as his back cracked with the stretch. He hadn’t realised how long he’d been hunched over the desk with his tools. The knock at the door had interrupted his concentration, but not enough to make a mistake in his work. His chisels were sharpened before each session; able to take nearly translucent millimetre shavings off of the wood he was working on. His hand stayed steady as he shaved down the last piece, muscle memory fighting the slight cramping of his fingers threatening to settle in.

Harry walked to the door and opened it, staring at a slim and calm-looking Professor Snape.

“Did we change the time?” Harry asked, glancing at his watch. He’d set a timer that morning when he started working on one of the wands Ron had grabbed from the snatchers, and it hadn’t gone off yet.

“No,” Snape said, standing in the doorway, but not looming. He was still dressed in severe black, but his cloak was slimmer fitting than his teaching robes, and his cheeks were rosy from the cold. “I have finished my errands early.”

Harry thought for a second before shrugging. 

“That’s fine.”

Harry set his chisel gently down on his desk and turned out the light over the wand. Snape had stepped in and moved to the couch, draping his cloak over the arm and placing his leather case by his feet. Harry swallowed back a smile as he saw that Snape had removed his shoes, and was in plain black socks.

“Tea?” Harry asked, sitting down in his worn armchair. It didn’t match the couch, but also didn’t clash with it, and Harry liked that. He’d had enough of matching sets living with his Aunt and Uncle.

“Please,” Snape said, not hiding his curious glances around the room. 

Harry picked up his wand and flicked it toward the kitchen, where sounds of a kettle starting to heat up started shortly after.

“What exactly is needed to finish the NEWTS?” Harry asked. “It’s not really something I had thought much about doing.”

Snape’s expression was unreadable, but Harry was used to that and it no longer bothered him.

“Why did you come back?” Snape asked instead. 

Harry leaned forward, placing his elbows on his knees and steepling his fingers on his chin. He tried to control his wince as a jolt of pain shot up his right arm, but Snape noticed it anyway. 

“I had always planned to. I don’t belong there anymore,” Harry answered. He got up again and went to the kitchen to make the tea, without asking how Snape took it. Without needing to.

“I heard you disappeared for a bit as well,” Harry continued, voice louder so Snape could hear him. 

“Convalescing,” Snape replied, his tone neutral. He was still looking around the flat when Harry came back from the kitchen.

“It still hurts you too?” Harry asked, handing Snape his tea. The hand that reached out to take it was slightly shaky, pale white near the ends of the fingertips and an angrier red tree branch-looking mark near the palm that disappeared under the hem of the sleeve.

“It was a curse, Potter.”

“Not Harry anymore?”

Snape looked away, before sipping his tea. “I hadn’t thought you’d want to remember that month. Dartmoor.”

“I remember it often,” Harry quietly said. 

A pecking at the window shattered the intensity of conversation, and with an annoyed look on his face, Harry got up to let the bird in. He didn’t bother to read the letter, just threw it to the table, and gave the owl a treat for its trip through the cold day.

Snape placed his cup down on the table and Harry could tell by the stiffness of his shoulders that the professor was back, and that there would be no more talk of Dartmoor. 

“A bit immature to be avoiding the post,” Snape said, his gaze on the pile of official ministry correspondence.

Harry scowled.

“It’s nothing to do with immaturity. There’s no deadline for my reply.”

“The number of envelopes contradicts that,” Snape sharply said, cutting to the point.

“And are you going to mark me on that?” Harry evenly said.

“Not for the NEWTS,” Snape replied, after a second’s thought. He didn’t clarify further.

Snape withdrew a single sheet of parchment from his leather case and, to Harry’s surprise, a small pair of thin grey framed spectacles.

“In order to receive your final NEWTS, you need to satisfy the following requirements: transfiguration qualification, the brewing of a complex potion, charms work, and an understanding of the government and organizational functions of the wizarding world.”

“No defence work,” Harry stated. He found himself calmer than he ever remembered being as a student listening to Snape. Knowing that the NEWTS would be nice to have but weren’t necessary definitely helped.

“No,” Snape said, the barest hint of a smirk hiding on his lips. “I believe your examples of work over the past 12 months are sufficient.”

He passed the paper over and Harry was surprised to see that the potion and spells he was required to do were written down plainly. He was expecting a test, or a pop quiz, or some sort of requirement to think quickly. Snape seemed to correctly assess Harry’s reaction.

“In the real world you will have instruction manuals and time to brew potions and cast spells. This is a ministry-set requirement, however, so they are included. The main focus of these lessons will be the last point: the preparation for life as a wizard.”

“That’s,” Harry started, “that’s good. The Weasleys have helped me with most things.”

“I am aware,” Snape said, flipping through some more parchment in his case. He withdrew a schedule and handed it to Harry. “We will start tomorrow with the potion. You will require these ingredients and…”

Snape looked around the flat again, and though he couldn’t see the kitchen, his look of scepticism that Harry owned a cauldron was pointed. “A cauldron.”

With that, Snape put his papers back in the case and stood, pulling the cuffs of his sleeves down over his hands.

“Right, tomorrow’s fine,” Harry said, also standing. He didn’t know whether he should show Snape to the door or not, but it seemed like the right thing to do. 

“Why did you choose to do this, over McGonagall?” Harry asked, his tone neutral. “She’s the one who did the NEWTS for Ron and Hermione.”

Snape first shook out, and then artfully swirled his cloak over his shoulders. 

“I could not resist the chance to welcome the Chosen One back to the wizarding world,” Snape said, making his sarcasm evident.

“Severus,” Harry started, and Snape raised his eyebrow, waiting.

“It… it is good to see you,” Harry lamely finished.

Snape pulled a small dark purple glass phial from his pocket and looked down at it, his thumb swiping over the cork stopper. He shook it a little, the swoosh of the liquid barely audible, before handing it over to Harry.

“There are some illegal ingredients contained within; take it and destroy the evidence,” Snape said. 

“It’s not going to explode on me, is it?” Harry asked, mostly joking but also with a slight amount of legitimate concern.

Snape’s eyes flashed a little brighter and he appeared to swallow back a smile.

“You may find it makes the cold less bothersome.”

“Oh. Thanks,” Harry said, glancing down at his arm.

“Tomorrow, Harry,” Snape replied, with a slight nod of his head as he stepped out the door.

……

Harry stared at the letters, laid out on the coffee table by order of delivery. Four from the auror division, one from Kingsley. The first was a general inquiry to his health and plans and an afterthought welcome back to the wizarding world. The second asked what his career plans were. The third asked if he would like to train in the auror division. The fourth offered a job. Kingsley’s note was a thinly veiled question as to why he wasn’t answering the first set of letters.

He tossed Kingsley’s letter back to the table and slouched on the couch. When he was fifteen, he’d wanted nothing more than to be an auror, to be the sort of wizard who chases down criminals and solves cases. Now just three years later he had an arm that he couldn’t fully rely on, a secret that kept him up at night thinking of how it would be reacted to once revealed, and a hobby instead of a job.

As if it knew that Harry was angry about it, his arm started to tingle with a sharp pin-like pain that started at his fingers and began radiating up his wrist. It had been quite bad the year earlier, when they’d first been cursed, but over the summer the pain had been much more tolerable, almost non-existent some days. Harry supposed that a curse that would burn his nerves away from the inside would naturally lend itself to being affected by the cold.

The bottle that Snape had given him was sitting behind the letters, and Harry could see the empty portrait of George to the right of it. Some people had had bigger prices to pay in the war, Harry reminded himself. It didn’t make him feel any better, and he downed the bland tasting potion in one go.

……

Harry watched a pair of bowtruckles do acrobatics on the branches of a wiggen tree as he waited for the shop attendant to finish ringing up another wizard’s purchases. He had a small bundle in one hand; apple wood, willow, and red oak blanks, and was holding a muffin in the other hand, just out of reach of a weird looking plant that kept trying to grab it. The plant shop was surprisingly busy for a Tuesday, but then, it was the Tuesday before Christmas and Harry noted that most of the sales were of Christmas plants and flowers. There were a few young wizards buying bouquets of perfume-y smelling flowers, and some older witches shopping for house plants and potion ingredients. A tall blonde witch with a bright green scarf stood hunched over a display of cacti, near the door.

Once he’d paid, Harry tucked the bundle in his coat pocket, uncaring that it stuck out a little, and turned to leave. He didn’t have a lot of plans for the afternoon, but also didn’t fancy spending a lot of time in the Alley.

“Mr Potter.”

Harry stopped, spying out of the corner of his eye that Ollivander was standing in a tiny aisle to his left, holding onto a box of _Fionnán Daley’s_ _Dragon Dung Plant_ _Enhancer_ with one hand, and his very handsome walking stick in the other.

“Mr Ollivander,” Harry greeted back.

“Very unusual to see into you so frequently,” Ollivander said. “And purchasing such fine wood. One would almost assume that you have begun making wands.”

Harry glanced down at the parcel in his pocket and shrugged.

“Not making, no. And not selling.”

“I see,” Ollivander said, giving Harry a smile that wasn’t fully genuine. Harry had no doubt from their earlier conversation that Ollivander would be more than a little interested in further inspecting his miraculously-fixed wand, and finding out more about the Elder wand. But he also knew that Ollivander had a business to run, a successful one, and that he’d likely not be so eager to share knowledge any more.

“That is fortuitous. I am, of course the oldest and most respected wandmaker and shop in England, but against Harry Potter, well. Perhaps not as strong of a competitor facing the star of the wizarding world.”

Harry felt his fingers twitch at that.

“I was a while ago. I think people are more interested in celebrating the first post-war holiday now. Happy Christmas, Mr Ollivander.”

Harry gave him a little wave and stepped back toward the door, making it clear that he wasn’t up for more awkward conversation.

“And to you as well, Mr Potter.”

Harry stepped out into surprisingly bright sunshine and headed back toward his flat. He knew eventually that Ollivander would find out that he was fixing wands, and hadn’t tried to fully hide it. He didn’t want to do it as a job, just as a hobby that he could use to help a few friends. It had seemed like a better way to spend his time, rather than working for the ministry.

……

_December 24th, 1997_

“Lumos.”

Light bounced around the small room to muggle lanterns hanging on the walls. There was a cast iron fireplace in the corner, a simple wooden table against one wall and two chairs opposite. At the end of the rectangle-shaped room was a tall platform, waist height, with a large mattress on it. Harry sat on the bed, against the wall, and Snape in one of the chairs, arms gingerly held motionless in their laps.

“A bothy.”

“Yeah,” Harry replied. “They’re mostly in Scotland, but there’s some in England too. To muggles this is just ruins.”

“I’m impressed, Potter,” Snape stood and walked to the table, mere steps away. He kept his arm as still as he could against his side, but Harry knew that it still hurt even with the small amount of movement.

“You planned a hideaway in advance.”

Snape looked down his considerable nose at the potion brewing away on the nicked and marred wooden table. There hadn’t been much stowed away for emergency potion brewing, but Snape had found enough to make something. Harry had wisely chosen not to mention that Snape’s potion brewing seemed to suffer when being done with his non-dominant hand.

“More than one. If you’ll note, Hermione isn’t here.”

“The one time it would have been helpful,” Snape grumbled. “This salve will need to be rubbed on our skin and hands. I’ve arrested the curse, but the nerves partially burned away. Growing them back will be extremely painful.”

“Brilliant,” Harry groused, slowly moving to push the blankets around on the bed. His right arm flopped down, having lost enough nerves at the bottom to have no control whatsoever over it. Every bump against the bed or wall shot sparks of pain up, but he was determined to make a bed, use whatever salve Snape had made, and pass out.

All he’d wanted was to see his parents’ grave for the first time, to see if he could feel some sort of closeness to them. Putting a tracer on the stone, and a curse, was such a petty act of cruelty that Harry felt like throwing something. 

Harry had been so focused on stuffing his pillow into the case that he hadn’t noticed Snape approach. Standing awkwardly at the edge of the platform, holding onto a small cauldron with a wood spoon sticking out of it, looking if he was debating whether to sit on the platform or just continue to stand.

“You may as well sit. It’s the only bed in the place and it’s big enough,” Harry crossly said. He waited for Snape to arrange himself on the wood platform, balancing the cauldron just off the edge of the mattress.

Harry figured he’d be doing a lot of strange tasks for the war, and had indeed done so over the years, but sitting in a small stone bothy just before Christmas, lathering a foul and yet oddly minty smelling salve on his arm whilst sitting next to Severus Snape was well beyond the strangest he thought would come up. Relief was coming to his burning fingers, and Harry worked to spread the salve faster.

“I was not expecting the stone to be cursed,” Harry said breaking the silence.

Snape raised his eyebrow at this, looking mostly unimpressed.

“A wizarding gravestone, in a wizarding village, belonging to the parents of the most wanted wizard in Britain. On Christmas Eve.”

Harry shrugged, and was pleased to find that the feeling in his arm had subsided quite a bit already.

“I reckon Vol...the dark lord is more wanted than I am. Just by different people. And you touched it too.”

“Yes,” Snape sighed. He stuck the wooden spoon back in in the cauldron and tapped his fingers, seeming pleased. His arms, though rather wiry, had a healthy amount of muscle on them and Harry was fascinated watching them tighten. The skin was mostly pale, with a dark smattering of hair, and no tattoos save for the ugly dark mark.

“Likely set by one of the many who appeared shortly after touching it,” Snape continued. He said nothing more, and Harry looked at him with suspicion.

“What aren’t you telling me?”

“I am suspicious that you trust me, after the events of the astronomy tower,” Snape threw back. The lighting in the bothy was brighter than it was in the dungeons of Hogwarts, and the lack of proper teaching clothes made it easy to see how much younger Snape seemed than he did as an imposing professor.

“You know why,” Harry said, scratching his shoulder. He, like Snape, was wearing just a t shirt, and though not as muscular, knew his arms looked fairly okay. “You said it earlier.”

“Silence isn’t trust,” Snape said.

“Except it sort of is,” Harry pointed out. “Some secrets can be very destructive. And that isn’t the only reason.”

“Working for the Order as a spy is not a valid reason,” Snape said, rolling his eyes. “It’s in the title.”

Harry was surprised to find himself almost smiling. It hadn’t been that long since he’d entertained thoughts of murdering Snape, or at least harming him, and here they were almost having a civil conversation.

“I realised a few things, not long after the night that you killed Dumbledore,” Harry started, watching Snape’s face for his reaction. There was a slight flinch that Harry did not miss. “The first was that the likelihood of the Half Blood Prince leaving his potions book in that cupboard for ten years for me to happen upon it was ridiculous. You planted it.”

Snape said nothing, but he did look like he was trying to hide the barest of smiles.

“Secondly, I used Dumbledore’s pensieve to go over my memory of that night. He asked you to kill him.”

This time he got a reaction, and it wasn’t a pleasant one.

“You know nothing of what he asked me,” Snape hissed, leaning forward so his hair draped across his face.

“And I can’t ask him,” Harry argued back. “But all along he’s said he’s trusted you. So, I tried to see why. And I still don’t know if I’m fully right to, though there’s not much choice now.”

Snape’s eyes were dark and piercing, but Harry wasn’t afraid of him. Somewhere between losing Dumbledore, and running for his life from the ministry, Snape had no longer become the scariest person in Harry’s life.

“I suppose you’ll have to wait and see,” Snape said, though he’d lost some of the vigour in his voice.

Harry rolled his eyes and turned, laying back onto the mattress. The salve Snape had made, which Harry was pretty certain he wouldn’t have done if he wanted to harm Harry, was working quite well and his right arm felt an almost numb tingling at the top of his shoulder, where the curse had been arrested. It was a welcome relief from the fiery burn when they’d first reached the bothy.

“Looks like I’ll have plenty of time,” Harry said, speaking to the wall. “Given that neither of us can move our wand hands, we can’t really leave here.”

A thick and awkward silence filled the bothy as that information landed, though Harry suspected Snape had already come to that realisation. Harry waited for an angry reply, but the reply was in a calmer tone that Harry didn’t expect.

“This is a very small space, Potter.”

“Yeah, it is,” Harry responded, managing to keep most of the sarcasm out of his voice. “There’s another set of blankets in the box by the fireplace. Sleep wherever you want.”

He rearranged his arm as he listened to Snape mutter and pull the blankets out of the box. The bothy had warmed up comfortably despite the bitter wind howling outside, and the oversized mattress on the platform was pretty comfortable.

“Well then,” Snape said, laying on the bed, stiffly and at the edge furthest from Harry. “Christmas eve in a run-down bothy in Dartmoor. I’m sure it’s exactly what Harry Potter asked for. Nox.”

Harry made a face, but didn’t turn to look at Snape. He’d gotten himself comfortable in the blankets and wanted to fall asleep before the salve wore off.

“Two years ago, you told me that I’d better be careful, because it’s a very lonely life,” Harry said instead, staring into the rafters above them. “As if that was any different from what it is now.”

……

  
  
_December 23 rd, 1998_

Harry opened the window and blinked at the whoosh of cold damp air that flew in with the post owl carrying the _Daily Prophet_. A smaller owl followed with a small folded letter, and Harry tossed them each a piece of sausage from his breakfast. Both were then immediately ignored, as Harry unfolded the paper and sighed at the front page, and the photo of him bundled up for winter as he walked through Diagon Alley.

“POTTER VS CARVER – BATTLE OF THE WANDMAKERS IN DIAGON ALLEY”

_For fuck’s sake_ , Harry thought.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Appreciate your patience with the update pace. Thank you for the notes! They are making a very blah January a bit friendlier.

_December 25 th, 1997_

The bothy had a small stone stoop, facing south and only somewhat shielded from the bitter morning wind. Harry could see the sun rising to his right, and through the trees to his left, a shielded view of _Believer Tor_. It was not a quiet morning; a fox or similar sized animal was wandering through the woods near the bothy, and birds were fluttering around. Harry sat with a cup of coffee as he took in the view, flannel trousers and a knit jumper not quite keeping him warm enough. He’d been fairly quiet sneaking out of the bothy, and it had helped that the bed was big enough for him to move without disturbing Snape.

Severus Snape.

Harry sighed into his cup. Certainly not who he’d planned to spend his Christmas with, but nothing to be done about that now. Hermione at least had left him a message on their DA coin, and let him know she was okay.

“Potter,” Snape said, opening the door. He’d evidently found the coffee supplies, as he held his own cup in his left hand. 

“Happy Christmas,” Harry said, looking back out into the woods.

Snape said nothing for a moment, just looked out upon his surroundings.

“If there is a way to contact Madame Pomfrey, I believe I can acquire a potion to regrow the nerves.”

Harry nodded, and finally stood up. Snape had put his regular robes back on, having no other clothes in the bothy, and Harry wondered for a split second if he only had the one outfit, or several copies of it.

“How long will that take?” Harry asked. “For the growth.”

Snape looked cross, but Harry wasn’t entirely certain it as directly solely at him.

“A fortnight. Perhaps more.”

Harry rubbed at his forehead. Two weeks in a tiny bothy with Snape. He was regretting answering the coded meeting message.

He walked back inside and rinsed his mug at the sink, aware of just how small the bothy really was. It had seemed ideal when Harry had first chosen it; both he and Hermione had found their own spots to run to just in case something happened, similar to their perilous and compromised flight from the Ministry.

Harry had clothes there, some linens, books, a first aid supply, and some food. He’d prepared to hunker down for a fortnight or two, and not need to put himself in further danger. Alone. He was still mostly safe, but the cursed arm put him at a disadvantage. And, he had company.

“Why am I here, Potter?” Snape asked, as if he’d been following along with Harry’s thoughts.

Harry pulled a piece of sourdough out of a bag from the cupboard, breaking the preservation spell on it.

“ _Kill the spare_.”

Harry turned around, leaning against the worktop, and saw that Snape was sitting on the edge of the bed with a blank look.

“He’s never cared about bystanders,” Harry said, pointing the bread at Snape. “You were disguised as a muggle. You would have been killed in half a thought.”

“I have been active in this war since before you were able to walk,” Snape waspishly said. “Your assumption that I would be so easily dispatched is incorrect.”

“Next time I’ll remember to poll them on their intentions then,” Harry snapped back.

“Potter– “

“No,” Harry said. “It’s done now, no changing it. I’ll contact Pomfrey, and we can plan the next steps to end the war.”

Harry popped the rest of the sourdough in his mouth and turned back to the door, struggling to put on his scarf one-handed and almost strangling himself with it.

“Leaving the safe house already,” Snape said, somehow looking less imposing, with his right arm hanging by his side and his left trying to turn pages of a book and keep it from closing.

“I’m going outside to train,” Harry pointed out, shrugging his coat on. “I’m not sure about you, but I’ve not exactly practised left-handed duelling.”

……

It was a fairly simple standing shower, but the water was steady and hot, and a welcome change from the rustic washbasin of the tent. Harry took a look at his arm, the spidery red nerve burn marks standing out clearly against his pale skin. It looked as painful as it was, and now that the salve had been washed off, the nerves were starting to feel scorched again.

He stepped out the bathroom for a minute, steam rising up to the rafters of the bothy as he grabbed the salve from the worktop. Snape, who was standing at the bookcase beside the bed, watched him intensely.

“What?” Harry asked, using magic to stick the pot to the worktop so he could open it with his left hand.

Snape didn’t stop staring, but snapped the book that he was holding shut.

“Put on the salve, Potter,” Snape finally said.

Harry shook his head and went back to the bathroom. After the salve was applied as best as he could, Harry put his shirt and jumper on and used a sticking spell to keep his right arm against his chest.

Snape had moved to the worktop when Harry came out the washroom, alternating tapping a muggle radio with his wand and turning the dial. It was all static, and Harry wasn’t certain that there was much signal where they were, but Snape was focused. He stopped when the dial was tuned to mostly static, the odd garble of words appearing. He was muttering at the radio, and to Harry’s surprise, crystal clear voices came through less than a moment later.

“A happy and safe Christmas to you all! River here, with the news of the day to share.”

“Is that…” Harry said, moving closer to the radio. He felt a small seed of hope upon hearing Lee’s voice.

Snape waved his hand in Harry’s general direction to shush him.

“We have news from Godric’s Hollow, where last night it is reported that twelve Death Eaters and Snatchers were killed. They were found in the same cemetery which houses the grave of the Potters, leading many to wonder if the Death Eaters were there for a ritual, for bait, or because they had found Harry. The cause of death is still to be determined, and the Minister is demanding a full investigation. Lucius Malfoy is rumoured to be amongst the dead.”

Harry felt the colour leave his face. He’d known it was a bomb of sorts, as Snape had told him. But he’d been the one to throw it, and that meant that he was the one responsible for killing the twelve.

“We’ve no news of Harry, of course, but we assume if Harry was one of the dead the Ministry would not keep that quiet,” Lee continued. “In other news, more reports of a mysterious benevolent actor at Hogwarts are emerging, helping to keep some of the students safe and fed during these dark times. Thank you, to whomever you are.”

Harry stared at Snape, who had an oddly pleased look on his face as he continued listening to the radio.

“Be safe, to all you resisters out there, and think of your fellow muggles if they’re in danger. It’s been months of terror from the Death Eaters, and yesterday’s massacre of some of them could be the start of a bloody turn in this war. We’ll be sure to keep you informed. The next password will be ‘Hedwig’, and we’ll try to be on again tomorrow.”

Snape terminated the spell on the radio and the bothy fell silent once more.

“What, exactly, was your intention with that candle bomb?” Harry asked. He was angry that he’d become a murderer, that he had acted out of split-second reaction without knowing what would happen. A small part of him wasn’t surprised at the destructiveness though, as Snape had been the one to create _sectumsempra_ , and Harry knew exactly how deadly that spell could be.

“A final means of escape, in a life-or-death situation,” Snape said. He didn’t sound guilty, or defensive, and Harry wondered how many back-against-the-wall weapons he had on him. “The only thing stopping them from murdering you on sight is that the Dark Lord has demanded the pleasure himself. The rest of us are not so fortunate.”

“Right, but aren’t you accepted as one of them? Certainly killing a bunch of Death Eaters and Snatchers will make things worse.”

“It will accelerate the hunt for you,” Snape acknowledged with an even voice. “Which is why you must act _faster_.”

“Yeah. I’ll get right on that,” Harry said, sitting down on the chair closest to the fireplace. “Unless you can tell me where his horcruxes are hidden, I don’t need to hear your opinions on speed, _Professor_.”

“Horcruxes,” Snape repeated, his expression growing stormy. “Literal objects to render the user immortal.”

“Fancy way of saying the bastard can’t easily be killed,” Harry grumbled.

Snape was muttering under his breath and Harry could tell that he was reviewing every bit of information he’d ever learnt about horcruxes. A curse word or two were also muttered, but Harry assumed that they were for Dumbledore and not for him.

“More than one,” Snape said, and Harry could tell he was angry at this turn of events, even though he must have suspected something like it to call their meeting the night before. “This is the task Dumbledore left three 17-year-olds in charge of.”

“Six,” Harry said, pulling the locket out of his pocket and putting it on the table. Snape was studying him, watching the tight hold Harry had on the chain, and the slight twitch of Harry’s head as his hand made contact with the glass of the locket. “You Know Who doesn’t know we’re looking for them. Not yet. Once we’ve destroyed them, it’ll just be us. Me and him. Like the prophecy said.”

Harry drummed his fingers on the table. He’d not spoken the plan aloud in months. Ron and Hermione knew of it, and now Snape, but putting it into vocalised words felt like putting a termination date on himself.

Snape uttered something that sounded suspiciously like 'seven' under his breath, before storming out of the bothy. Harry glanced at the door and listened as Snape made his way to the back of the bothy, where a large stack of wood was for the stove. He made a mental reminder for himself to ask Snape for further explanation later, as it seemed like Snape knew more than he was telling. As usual.

Harry went to town to get food shortly afterward, and the rest of the day was spent quietly. Snape working outside and then brewing more salve, and Harry reading over a book on wands and wand woods, in an effort to narrow down more what potential objects Voldemort may have chosen as a representation of Ravenclaw. Snape refused to answer any questions Harry had on horcruxes, and Harry finally decide to leave it till the next day.

……

_December 23 rd, 1998_

The floor was uneven by the fireplace, Harry idly thought. It was a bit Christmassy – the emerald green flames and the ruby red salamander that was poking its head out from under the largest log.

“Hi Harry.” The voice came through before the image of the face cleared, and Harry nodded at the flames.

“Hi Den.”

“Thanks for the fire call,” Den said. He looked like he’d not been awake long, with hair sticking up at all angles and his tie draped around his shoulders. He resembled his brother, but had grown into his own over the past year.

“I wanted to ask if you’d do an interview, for our new magazine.”

“I’m not exactly a fan of print papers right now,” Harry said, holding up the _Daily Prophet_ with a blank look on his face.

Den nodded, chewing on his bottom lip.

“We’ve called this _The Brass Telegraph_ ,” Den said, passing through a glossy black magazine with a cover image of a burning Hogwarts. It was a hard image, bodies somewhat visible in the rubble at the base of the castle. “Brass for commanders, for officiality. For telling the truth even if it’s hard to hear.”

Harry flipped through a few pages, noting the mixture of articles and provocative photos. Clearly Colin hadn’t been the only one in the family with a skill for photography.

“Middle ground between the _Prophet_ and the _Quibbler_?” Harry asked. His thumb rubbed over the logo on the cover- a small brass coin that looked very similar to the DA coins they both had.

“That’s the idea. A source of news not run by the Ministry, and with more believability than the _Quibbler_.”

Harry smiled. “How many issues have you had?”

“Four. This is the first, just after the war. We’ve done some on the rebuilding, the back to school re-opening, a piece on the Ministry, and a back to regular life piece. They have sold, but not as much as we’d hoped.”

Harry stirred his coffee, tapping the spoon delicately against the lip of the cup. Den was a few years younger, Harry remembered, still with a year or two left at Hogwarts. He seemed to have matured quickly, though Harry supposed losing his brother played a large part in that. He was looking at Harry with an intense gaze, and Harry knew a more direct ask was coming. 

“What exactly are you asking?”

“A focus piece,” Den said, immediately. “A soft interview; I have questions, but you can choose what to answer.”

“My thoughts on the war?”

“And what you’re doing now, plans for the future. People look up to you,” Den said.

“People need a different hobby,” Harry replied, closing the magazine. “I’ll think about it.”

……

Harry landed softly in the flattened grass to the north west of the Burrow, the whoosh of his arrival hidden by the sharp December wind. The trees and meadow were silent and shrouded by dark grey skies, the smoke from the several chimneys mixing in with the clouds. Instead of the bustling main house though, Harry walked toward the warmly-lit garage.

“Mind the shovels, Harry,” Arthur greeted.

He’d managed to collect several varieties of muggle shovels and stack them by the back door, just in the way enough that they were a tripping hazard.

“Hi Arthur,” Harry greeted. He perched himself on a stool and discretely cast a warming spell, smiling at the rusted muggle space heaters that Arthur was trying to heat the garage with.

“Something on your mind? You know Molly won’t let you hide out here the whole time,” Arthur said. He was carrying a wrench in his hand and randomly using it to try to adjust knobs on the machines around him.

“Sort of,” Harry answered. Arthur said nothing, but instead gave Harry time to sort out his thoughts. “Colin Creevey was a boy in the year below me. Used to take a ton of photos at Hogwarts, fairly annoying at the time. His brother Denis is starting a magazine.”

Arthur nodded and put the wrench down.

“Already started, I think.”

“Yeah,” Harry said, “but having trouble being taken seriously. He’s asked me for an interview.”

The wind rattled the small window by the door and Harry glanced over, noticing that it had begun snowing.

“I think you should consider it,” Arthur said. “Especially given today’s _Prophet_.”

“It’s a load of bollocks,” Harry grumbled. “Ollivander asked if I was making wands, and I just said—”

“Most of us know that the _Prophet_ is a half-truth more often than not,” Arthur told him, with a smile. “But this new magazine doesn’t have such a reputation as of yet. You can help form it.”

Harry scratched his chin, the day-old stubble feeling tingly against his right fingers.

“I want to help him. And I want to think that doing one interview will put to rest any further requests.”

Arthur raised his eyebrow and waited.

“There are several things I don’t particularly wish to share.”

“Harry,” Arthur said, sighing a little. He picked up the wrench again and tapped it against his hand. “You’ve been a famous wizard since you were a baby– “

“But it’s doesn’t give them a right to know about me,” Harry interjected.

“No, it doesn’t,” Arthur agreed. “But they are interested, so now is your chance to define exactly what you’re willing to give them.”

“So give my last hurrah interview,” Harry said. “Telling people to leave me alone.”

Arthur sighed again. 

“You could do that,” he agreed. “But what about using your interview as a way of, coming out, as the muggles would say.”

Harry stilled in his seat and stared at Arthur. Ron and Hermione knew he was gay, of course – they’d met Luke and they’d also met Alice. But Harry had tried to keep it secret from everyone else.

“We know about Luke,” Arthur gently said, “Molly and I. And that you’re worried what everyone will think.”

“You’ve never said…” Harry said.

“Why should we? We’d like all our kids happy and safe, and that seemed to be the case.”

Harry smiled and swallowed roughly. He’d met more than a few gay guys at the bookshop who’d not had good coming out experiences, and had been worried about it with the Weasleys as well. Worrying for naught, it turned out.

“But it will be a surprise to others. You have the chance to normalise that.”

Harry smiled a little and then ran his hand through his hair.

“Maybe I don’t always want to be the one to go first.”

Arthur laughed.

“No one does, Harry. You aren’t the only gay wizard, of course. The older generation remember gossip columns written about our old headmaster, and a few others. Confirmed bachelors, they called them.”

“The gossip columns are exactly where I don’t want to be,” Harry glumly said. “And as Hermione pointed out, there aren’t many gay wizards that are even around for me to date. Maybe it’s not worth it.”

“Your happiness is always worth it,” Arthur said, smiling wistfully and looking out the window toward the Burrow. 

“What do the older generation say about an age gap then?” Harry asked. “Remus wasn’t particularly eager to date Tonks because of that.”

“Ah, yes,” Arthur said. “Though I think that was rather more the reason he used to cover up his concerns on being a _werewolf_ in love.”

Harry gave a short depreciating laugh.

“You’ll find two sorts, Harry. The ones who met at Hogwarts and stayed together, they’ll be around the same age as each other. And the ones who met at work or at some sort of wizarding event; they’ll be more different. We live a lot longer than muggles do, so a few years here or there doesn’t matter much in the end.”

“I suppose,” Harry said. They heard a clanging coming from the direction of the Burrow, and made their way to the door. Molly only rang once for lunch before she started serving.

“I do think that anyone I end up with, I’ll be judged for by the paper,” Harry continued, as they walked up to the kitchen door.

“Yes, that’s very likely,” Arthur acknowledged. He clapped Harry on the back as they stepped through the door. “Just as they would if it were a witch.”

……

“Harry this is tops,” George said, holding his wand up to the light. The spruce wood glowed like honey under the warm kitchen light, and Harry had left a small dark jagged line in the dogwood where he’d joined Fred’s wand core to George’s.

Molly passed Harry the bowl of roasted potatoes as she beamed, not even admonishing George for conjuring sparks of fireworks above the table.

“Feels right, then?” Harry asked. He sat back quickly as a firecracker zipped around the seats and zoomed by his face.

“It’s brilliant,” George said. He set off a few more spells, causing Ron to jump out of his seat and Ginny to swat at the air as a few more firecracker sprites danced around. Hermione looked a mixture of fighting a laugh and slightly terrified as she ducked, and Percy looked aggrieved as he became a target for things whizzing round his head.

Harry felt rather proud. He’d done a few wands after the war, under the pseudonym of Barny Weasley, but he hadn’t received much feedback beyond the first usage. George would be able to give it as necessary, though Harry suspected he was pretty happy with the wand as is.

“For you, Mum,” George said, conjuring a beautiful bouquet of flowers out of the air. As she took them two of the flowers blew raspberries at her, and she rolled her eyes.

Harry settled back into his chair, content and full from the tasty lunch. He caught a glance of the portrait sat at the end of the table, of Fred quietly watching his brother laughing and pranking Arthur with an easily-summoned box of Wheezes chocolates from upstairs. A wistful smile was on his face, and though to an outsider he looked fairly happy, Harry was well familiar with the feeling of being content, and yet also lonely on the side lines.

……

Snape knocked once on Harry’s door and then entered, seeming to know that the wards would permit it. Harry was just finishing up his morning dishes, and came to the sitting room a moment later. He’d already set up a cauldron and the ingredients on the coffee table, which had been raised to the proper height for a brewing table.

Snape spent fifteen minutes lecturing Harry on the pain-relieving cream he was to brew, and the ingredients contained within. It was like being lectured by the Half-blood Prince, as Snape went through the official recipe and then added his own comments to nearly every sentence about how to improve it and why that certain step was inaccurate.

“You’re not as intimidating,” Harry said ten minutes later, stirring his potion anti-clockwise, “when you’re not storming around the dungeon looming over cauldrons.”

Snape pursed his lips as he watched Harry carefully. He was leaning against Harry’s work desk, and had been observing quietly as Harry brewed, spinning a piece of the red oak from the desk in his hands.

“You brew slightly better than a troll when you cheat and read from my book.”

Harry grinned, his hand holding the page of _Advanced Potion Making_ open.

“Not stolen,” Harry said. “You left it for me.”

“You have no evidence of that,” Snape mildly countered.

“You won’t convince me otherwise,” Harry said. Snape changed the topic, which only cemented Harry’s theory.

“How did you get food to the bothy?” Snape asked.

“What?” Harry asked. “Last year? I just went to the shops.”

“You refused to give me details during this time, citing mistrust and possible danger, and yet you just went shopping in public?”

There was no missing his annoyed tone, but Harry ignored it.

“Yeah. I would go to big cities on match days. Blend in with the crowd,” Harry stopped to count his stir rotations, and then continued when Snape kept quiet.

“Liverpool in particular was the best. Far from the bothy, no one I knew from there, and they liked to party. I just wore red and wandered through the highstreets, looking like I was part of it.”

Harry looked up and noted that Snape was staring at him, which either meant that he was impressed or thought the idea incredibly stupid.

“It was particularly helpful because even when there wasn’t a match, there were almost always stag and hen nights. As far as I know neither the Death Eaters or Snatchers ever looked for me there.”

“No,” Snape said. “Because they expected you to _hide_.”

Harry shrugged. He twirled his wand over the cauldron and cast the last spell, before standing back.

“With your left?” Snape said, sharp as ever.

“It works better than my right sometimes,” Harry told him. “The nerves are back, but…the change is noticeable some days.”

Snape nodded and came over to inspect the potion.

“You have that too?” Harry asked, wondering if he’d get a response. As expected, Snape didn’t answer.

“The colour isn’t quite right,” Snape said, lifting the ladle out of the cauldron and letting some of the cream drop back down to the cauldron. “But the smell is accurate.”

“I lose points for the colour,” Harry stated, “even though the cream will still work.”

“That will be up to Headmistress McGonagall, once she receives my notes.”

Snape summoned a small glass jar from his briefcase and ladled some of the potion into it.

“Hang on, are you not the one handling my NEWTS?” Harry asked.

“Proctoring,” Snape replied. He capped the jar and sent it back to his case. “The Headmistress is busy.”

Harry narrowed his eyes at that. Snape had turned away and was packing up his things, notebook placed back in the case, sample protected with a spell and put next to the notebook.

“That’s not enough of a reason to make you spend time with me,” Harry said, banishing the cauldron and potion to the kitchen. “You only spent time with me last year because we couldn’t leave. At first.”

Snape summoned his shoes and stepped into them, the laces doing themselves up as his feet settled.

“A harmonious anomaly,” Snape said, keeping Harry’s eye contact. “In any event, you- “

“Why are you here?” Harry interrupted. “Because I thought you came back wanting more of what we had at Dartmoor.”

“We didn’t have anything at Dartmoor,” Snape said, his eyes dark and focused.

“We had a shit situation under the stress of war,” Harry argued. “But it was all right, and I want to see if we can get back to it, without the whole war bit. But you’re just being evasive and pretending that things are normal when they’re not.”

“You don’t get to– “

“Because you’ve never been this…. this pleasant before. Not since Dartmoor,” Harry pressed, properly worked up and ready for a good row. “So how else am I supposed to take this? I don’t even know what you do now that the war’s over.”

“What I do is–

“And I don’t actually care about the NEWTS either. I thought it was a good way to start talking again, now that we’re not in hiding.”

“Would you stop interrupting me, Harry!” Snape snapped.

Harry lifted his chin up in defiance but waited.

“What happened in Dartmoor– “

“The sex. The conversations–” Harry clarified.

“– _Potter_.”

“Severus,” Harry crossed his arms. Snape looked like he wanted to strangle Harry, which was an expression that Harry was used to and was oddly more comforting than it was concerning.

“Not in hiding?” Snape challenged, his voice low but steady. Harry looked away, heat rising to his cheeks. “People will accept war as justification for many things, but now we are no longer at war.”

“And they no longer need us. Why should we give them any second consideration?” Harry said, some of the fight gone out. This morning’s blasted _Daily Prophet_ was on the floor by the door, and clearly Snape had seen it.

“This isn’t like the movies,” Harry continued. “I don’t even know if we’ll like each other for that long. But maybe we will.”

Snape stood still, taking a moment to consider his reply as he fixed his scarf around his neck.

“And I know you know what movies are, Severus.”

Snape turned his head sideways, and Harry saw a trace of amusement in his expression.

“That is enough for today.”

He opened the door and stepped into the hall, stopping but not turning back when Harry spoke next.

“Fear of happiness is a terrible reason to stand behind.”

“I am not afraid,” Snape curtly said, turning back and making sharp eye contact. “You’re concerned about coming out. Imagine the reaction if they then hear of your interest in a former Death Eater.”

Snape walked off down the stairs as the door closed behind him. Harry felt like opening it and slamming it again, but resisted the urge. He almost wished Dartmoor had never happened, that he’d never realised that Snape could be a source of comfort, of conversation; more than his acerbic professor self that Harry had known all his wizarding life. Harry picked up the piece of red oak from his desk, which he only imagined to still be warm from touch, and threw it across the room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YNWA!


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A rough and very much not to scale sketch of the bothy's layout: https://ibb.co/HzcwRPS
> 
> If anyone is curious about the woods I am picking, my sources of information are, personal working experience with the woods, the Pottermore articles on wand woods, and the very excellent (muggle) Wood Database site.

_December 24 th, 1998_

London held a different sort of background noise than Diagon Alley did - more mechanical and robotic - as if in the span of Harry leaving the Leaky and stepping onto Charing Cross road, a whole industrial revolution had happened. Bright signs and Christmas adverts flickered their wares at him as he walked by, weaving his way through the tourists and shoppers with large boxes and bags. It was still early morning, not yet 10, but last-minute shoppers were never short on supply no matter what the holiday. 

Alice’s place was a short tube ride away, or, if Harry could manage a quiet spot, a quick apparition. 

Muggles didn’t normally notice these things, Harry thought to himself, as he passed a small alleyway with only two touristy-looking people in it. If a strange alien was believed capable of landing a bright blue box in the city and no one noticing, well… Harry glanced up and when they both appeared to be staring at something, took his chance and spun away.

Alice’s flat was near Borough Market, a second-floor walk-up that she shared with two roommates, who worked the night shift and thus Harry had met only twice.

“Hello, foolish boy,” Alice greeted, yanking open the door. It stuck slightly due to age and wonkiness and yielded with great effort. “What on earth are you wearing?”

“A cloak,” Harry grumpily answered, wiping his feet and then kicking his shoes off just inside the flat.

“It’s…very old fashioned,” she said, looking him up and down. “How’d you…why does it look so new?”

Alice stood aside as Harry passed through, holding her hand out for the cloak to hang up. Harry kept it with him though, draping it over a kitchen chair. 

“It’s new,” Harry said, slumping into the chair and not explaining further. “Why are some men such twats?”

Alice raised her eyebrows and put on the kettle. 

“I don’t know, love. I used to be one and I still don’t understand’em.”

She dug out two mugs and watched with a curious look as Harry winced, then absentmindedly fished a jar out of his cloak pocket. 

“What the fuck is that?” Alice said. The jar was small, with a wax covered lid, and full of red sinew-like strands. He’d forgotten to take it out of his pocket after going to Slug and Jiggers.

“Tendons,” Harry said, which was not quite a lie. Dragon heartstring was technically a tendon. “For a Christmas recipe.”

It was a lame excuse and Alice clearly didn’t buy it, but didn’t question further. She came back to the table with two mismatched mugs, spoons sticking out of each, and a milk jug. Her glance to check the expiration date on the jug was not subtle, but that was Alice and Harry knew not to take milk at her place.

“All right, spill to Auntie Alice,” she said, taking a seat.

Harry rolled his eyes and took the mug.

“There’s nothing really to spill. We had a row. Sort of.”

“Your man?”

“Yes,” Harry said. “I thought we were going to continue. Now he’s not sure.”

“He’s not out? And concerned about people finding you both out?”

She was sitting across from him, wrapped up in a chunky knit sweater and holding her mug like it was her own little furnace. Her hair was tied away from her face, but as it was curly some of it had fallen out, and it reminded him a bit of Hermione’s hair. She was two years older than him, and Harry appreciated that she was like an older sister with sage advice to give.

“Yeah, well, he’s older than me,” Harry said.

“We’ve all been there,” she said. “It’s a small world to choose from.”

“You have no idea,” Harry muttered. “Severus knows it too. But he’s so fucking stubborn still.”

“ _Severus_ …” she repeated, under her breath.

“Keeps telling me that he’s not the right match, that he’s corrupted. As if I didn’t mur—”

Harry looked up and saw Alice’s incredulous expression.

“This is getting a little odd,” Alice quietly said, hands tightly around her mug, looking at Harry with a guarded expression.

Harry sighed. Alice had gotten to know him over the summer and autumn, to know that he was an orphan, that he’d gone to school in Scotland, and she’d later met Ron and Hermione. But Harry knew there was a line between quirky and alarming, and that he was quickly approaching it.

“It’s a weird name, Severus,” Harry started. “It suits him though. He was my professor. He was in the same accident that I was that caused this.”

He turned his hand over, showing a bit of the scarring peeking out from under his sleeve. She’d seen the scarring before, but Harry had always been evasive answering any questions about it.

“He did some bad things when he was younger, and was frankly mean as a professor, so he doesn’t have the best reputation in our community. I do, though. For now.”

“Which is why you’re worried about coming out,” Alice said.

“Yeah.”

She nodded, and sat in thought. Harry flexed his fingers, enjoying the heat from the mug on his sore hand. He’d had a few good days, but the weather was turning again and he could feel the ache slowly moving along his nerves.

“How does he treat you?”

Harry remembered the year before, the care and bickering during the month in Dartmoor, the times Snape had saved him at school, and what Snape had done in the war to help him win.

“I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him.”

“Tell him that then.”

“It won’t work,” Harry said. “He hates showing his good side. I don’t know if he thinks he has to be this miserable old sod because that’s what he pretended to be for so long, or if he actually is one. But it’s like he refuses to let himself be happy.”

“Mm, hard lesson for us all,” Alice said. “It’s not always easy to let go of who you were and take the chance.”

Harry smiled at her. He’d only ever known her as Alice, but he knew that she’d had a rough transition and that her family stubbornly continued used her deadname. She’d been kicked out, beaten up, and was still fighting to legally change her gender. But she was here, and mostly happy, and one of the first to be truly welcoming to him in the London gay community.

“That could be it,” Harry said. “He did challenge me about hiding, and not being out. Maybe part of it is that I’m _not_ out publicly yet, and he doesn’t want to deal with hiding. Luke said something similar.”

He sighed a bit and stirred some sugar into his tea.

“I guess he wants me to be honest with who I am,” Harry said.

“I’ve always said you have to sort yourself out first to be happy,” Alice said. “So, the question is, who are you?”

Harry nodded, staring down at the table as he thought. It was logical: he was a well-known wizard, and Snape was the same for less than positive reasons. No matter how he announced it the press would be all over them, and they’d look for any weak spot to question him about. Snape had also spent years as a spy, and might honestly just be tired of pretending to be someone he wasn’t.

“No really,” Alice said, tapping his hand and startling Harry out of his thoughts. “Who the fuck are you?”

She had a grin on her face when she said it, but Harry knew she was still questioning a bit of his eccentricities from earlier.

“You don’t think I’m an Addams anymore? Maybe I’m a famous wizard who saved the world, then,” Harry dryly countered. “Who the fuck are you?”

Alice threw back her head and laughed. “If you sing that fucking song at me, wizard-boy, I will clobber you.”

“What song?” Harry asked, cup to his lips and wild smile on his face.

“Never mind,” she firmly told him. “Be sure of yourself and try again with your bloke. Now, we all know why you really came here.”

She pulled a box over from the side of the table and almost hit Harry’s heartstring jar over with the box’s lid. “To get your arse kicked at Mouse Trap.”

He grinned and snatched the jar away.

“Don’t be so smug. Oh, and this,” Harry said, pocketing the jar, “is to make my wood carvings stronger. I’m not actually going to eat it.”

She rolled her eyes and relaxed a bit.

“Do what you like with it, except put that nasty looking thing onto my table again.”

“It’s not that nasty,” Harry countered. “And I’m sure it could be used in some recipes.”

She gave him a disgusted look and continued setting up the traps on the board game.

“Do you have some where to go for Christmas?” Harry asked, continuing along that line of thought and surprised with himself that he hadn’t thought to ask earlier. “Because if you don’t…”

“Not a chance,” she immediately answered. “Me and some other exiled trans ladies do a dinner at the book shop every year, for the other gays and lesbians and in-betweens.”

“Oh,” Harry nodded, picking up the dice.

“Though I appreciate the thought,” Alice said. “I’m sure Christmas with the Addamses is just _delightful_.”

……

Christmas Eve in Diagon Alley was a little less busy than in muggle London, but the alley was still packed with people gaily chatting and buying last minute food parcels and little toys. Harry was able to easily make his way to Ollivander’s, keeping his right arm tucked carefully against his body to avoid bumping it against anything. He’d done well against Alice, winning three of their five games, and was feeling in a better mood than he’d woke up in.

Several people nodded at him, and some outright stared in curiosity as he went, but it wasn’t much different than when he was a student and spending part of his summer there.

The stares got a little more pointed as he entered the shop.

“Making quite the impression in your first month back, Mr Potter,” Ollivander said, barely looking up from the wand he was working on at the counter.

“I would have thought nearly six months away would make people care less,” Harry said, unwinding his scarf.

“They waited ten years for you to return the first time,” Ollivander said. He finally put the wand down and placed his hands on the counter. “I suppose, once again, that you are not here to purchase a wand.”

“I’m not here to be a competitor either,” Harry bluntly said. “I fix wands, as a hobby. Despite what the _Prophet_ said, I’ve no interest in opening a shop.”

Ollivander considered that for a few seconds, and then Harry heard the sounds of a kettle starting to boil. 

“Please,” Ollivander said, twirling his wand in a delicate swirl and transfiguring a stool out of a spare block of wood from his desk.

“Thanks,” Harry said. He was aware of some people passing by the front windows, but other than a few glances in through the glass, no one had entered the shop after Harry.

“I became more interested in wandlore at the end of the war, and did a lot of reading over the summer. Not for duelling or battles this time, though. There’s been a few people who’ve reached out, curious if their wands could be fixed or changed, because they weren’t acting the same as before the war.”

“Surely these witches and wizards could have purchased new ones, that complemented their personalities best,” Ollivander said. He’d made the tea, and left the milk and sugar for Harry to do himself.

“But they didn’t want to,” Harry pointed out. “They liked their wands, and just wanted a small change to bring back that warmth again. A little variation of wood, an addition or a replacement, to match who they’ve become.”

Ollivander looked deep in thought.

“The method for wand-making goes back centuries, Mr Potter,” Ollivander said. “A core, a piece of wood from a gifted tree, and the skill of a wandmaker to shape and combine the two. People have tried in the past to use substandard cores and woods, but always to the detriment of the quality of magic produced.”

“This isn’t substandard though,” Harry said. “They’re all wands from your shop, and the woods used are sourced from Diagon Alley.”

He saw someone peering through the shop window from outside, and recognising Rita Skeeter, whipped his wand toward the windows. In less than a second black curtains exploded across the windows, blocking her sinisterly eager and curious face.

“Powerful wand work,” noted Ollivander. “Though that once again brings us back to you preventing me from making a sale.”

“I’m sure Rita Skeeter was here to see the latest in wand design,” Harry dryly said. He then held his wand up and twisted his hand around, showing Ollivander the small bit of black walnut that he’d added to the palm rest.

“Black walnut, seeks a master of powerful insight and good instincts. Not the easiest to master, a flair for charm work.”

Ollivander squinted and studied the small, knut sized piece of walnut that Harry had added to the underside of his wand, where the bark handle was.

“Very curious,” Ollivander said. “No loss of power?”

“No,” Harry confirmed. “Better focus, in fact.”

Harry stuck his wand back in his pocket. 

“I changed, during the war. After it. It made sense to me that the wand might be looking for the person I used to be, and need a small update to match the person I am now.”

“I had heard rumours of a wand fixer,” Ollivander finally said, speaking over his tea cup as he held it up to his lips. “In the city. Something I dismissed as a charlatan’s work.”

Harry fought a scowl, and reminded himself that Ollivander had been in business for decades and as such was very defensive of his work and reputation.

“Must you always assume the worst, Mr Ollivander?” Harry asked, fighting to keep his tone neutral.

“I have standards, Mr Potter,” Ollivander said. “Especially if said person –you— were to be altering my own wands. I will not be responsible for any death or disfigurement from some unauthorised changes.”

Harry rolled his eyes.

“Nor if the quality of wood was inferior, or the core changed. There are only three cores that any Ollivander wand uses.”

“Yes,” Harry said, sitting up straighter and holding up three left fingers. “Unicorn hair, dragon heartstring, phoenix feather.”

Ollivander nodded, but Harry kept speaking.

“But what of thestral hair?"

Ollivander paused, as the comment registered, and then frowned.

“There is only one well-known wand of thestral hair core, and its destruction is horrific,” Ollivander said, his voice low to keep anyone from overhearing. Harry suspected that whenever wandmakers spoke to each other, the subject of the Elder wand was hushed and revered.

“Thestral hair cores are mastered only by those capable of facing death,” he added.

“But what does that mean? We all face death at some point. There’s bad omens regarding both thestrals and wands made with their hair, of course, but it could also be a misunderstanding,” Harry calmly said. He pulled an envelope out of his pocket and revealed a neatly tied knot of wispy black hair.

“Luna sent me these.”

Ollivander’s expression changed swiftly, softening and losing some of its guardedness.

“She was my friend,” Ollivander said, staring at the envelope before looking up at Harry. “She spoke highly of you.”

“She’s my friend too,” Harry said. “She introduced me to the Hogwarts thestrals, made me consider that maybe they aren’t an omen of death after all.”

Harry brought out the Care of Magical Creatures book from his bag, and opened the page to the details of thestrals. “But perhaps their hair makes a wand best suited to someone who has accepted death. Faced it, yes, but maybe also had control of it, or come to peace with it.”

“A murderer’s wand,” Ollivander mused. “Or a wand only for those of considerable age.”

“Plenty of children see death, Mr Ollivander. Luna had.”

There was a pause in the conversation as the reality of that sunk in. Harry raised the blinds again in the wand shop, satisfied that Skeeter appeared to have left the alley. He knew there’d be another article written about them, but there wasn’t much he could do about that.

He felt good, happy to have someone to talk to about theories and obscure information he’d learnt about wands. He missed the strategic discussions of magical theory in the tent during his year on the run, and it was refreshing to be able to debate about it, without his life hanging in the balance of the results.

“As the wand chooses the wizard, not many will find nor choose a child destined to see death. Not when there are many more positive characteristics to choose from,” Ollivander finally said. He shifted in his stool, leaning against the counter top, and the floor gave a friendly creak as it accepted his weight.

“But a fixed wand has already chosen its wizard,” Harry quietly countered, putting his empty mug down. “And there are many who have seen death this year.”

“Do you propose I start offering a repair service?”

“Yes,” Harry immediately said. “Me. I can work out of your shop, and you get some of the profits.”

Ollivander did not say no right away, and Harry felt a slight tinge of hope.

“With advertising?”

“I don’t need my name on the sign, if that’s what you mean,” Harry said. “But I like doing this, and I want to learn more about wand making.”

“Why, Mr Potter?” Ollivander asked. “You have done great things, as I imagined you would when I placed your wand with you. I even suspect that you could work nearly anywhere you please after what you’ve done. Why here?”

Harry offered a small smile.

“Because before I was a wizard, before magic and Hogwarts, and before I was the chosen one, I was a boy who had to fix things. Fix toys, fix watches, fix clothing, fix whatever I had to make it work for me. It was pretty satisfying. More so than knowing what I’ve done in battle.”

Ollivander pursed his lips and considered this, finally nodding. He leaned over and rummaged through the shelves behind the desk, finally bringing a long piece of wood out on the counter, roughly the same size of a wand box. It was a rich purple in colour, with a slightly wavy grain, and appeared to be quite dense.

“I’m interested to see what you make of this, Mr Potter,” he said, pushing the wood forward. “Purple heart, and though I am quite confident that it is of a tree with the gift, it has not been much studied as a wand wood.”

“You want me to make a wand with this?” Harry asked, staring at it. The colour was like no wood he’d ever seen before.

“I want you to experiment with it,” Ollivander corrected, and Harry very much felt like he’d just been handed a test. “I have some theories, of course, of how it would be suitable as a wand wood.”

“It’s really nice,” Harry said, holding up the block and admiring the deep eggplant colour and grain.

“Report on your findings,” Ollivander said. “And I will consider your proposal.”

Harry smiled, satisfied enough with that. He hadn’t expected a yes right away, and was pleased with how the conversation had gone. He’d had entirely too much tea between Alice and Ollivander’s though, and stood up from the stool to head home.

“Your thestral hair,” Ollivander said, pushing the envelope toward Harry, and flinching slightly when he touched the hair, as if he hadn’t expected to.

“You can’t see it, can you?” Harry quietly asked, as he put on his scarf.

“I am fortunate not to be able to,” Ollivander acknowledged, turning back to work on his wand once again.

……

He wore his best jeans, and his favourite jumper, the oatmeal knit one that he’d had at the bothy and which only had a handful of tiny wood shavings trapped in its knit. He’d filled out the first step of the potion recipe card, with the time and date, and it had been crossed out an hour earlier. His hair refused to calm down, but Harry suspected that was due to his agitated state.

Harry heard a polite knock on his door, which annoyed him up even further. Snape had just walked in before, and now —and _now_ —he was taking the time to use his manners. Harry walked to the entryway, his footsteps intentionally heavier than they normally were, and forcefully pulled back the door. 

He was standing in a way that he blocked the entrance, firm and decided with his arms crossed, ready to face Snape for what would likely be another rough conversation.

He was not expecting to see Kingsley, nor the knowing smile that flitted across Kingsley’s face.

It rather ruined the effect, Harry thought.

“Hi,” Harry said after a second, standing back so Kingsley could come in. 

“Well, I’m glad I’m not the person you were expecting to see. Shall I come back?”

He had a happy smile on his face and Harry couldn’t help but relax a little. 

“No, it’s fine,” Harry said, scratching behind his ear. “You’re here about the letters?”

“The letters you’ve been ignoring? Yes, I did wonder if my owl arrived.”

Kingsley looked around the room unashamedly, taking in the large desk area that Harry had set up, the takeaway carton on the coffee table, muggle tv, and the nest of blankets Harry had on the couch.

“They did; I’ve just been busy,” Harry said. He itched to go stand by his desk, to hide what he was working on, feeling self-conscious about it

“So I see. Looks like home in here already,” Kingsley said. Harry didn’t get the feeling he was being sarcastic either. “But I’ll get to the point before whomever you were waiting for gets here. I want to offer you a job, Harry. No NEWTS, no special exams, just immediate entrance into the auror academy and a guaranteed spot as an auror.”

“I’d gathered that from the letters,” Harry said, smiling. Kingsley looked expectantly at Harry, then one eye brow raised at the pause in conversation.

“And you’re... going to tell me no,” Kingsley guessed, looking straight at Harry’s eyes with a kind and open look. “You won’t, or you can’t?”

“A bit of both,” Harry admitted. “I’ve found something I like doing. Maybe it’ll work out, maybe it won’t. But I like it and I don’t need to worry it’ll get my friends killed”

“I hope you don’t mean that the _Prophet_ accurately reported on something,” Kingsley said, with amusement in his voice.

“No,” Harry laughed. “I do work on wands, as you can see. But I’m not opening a shop, and certainly not trying to compete with Ollivander.”

Kingsley nodded, and his gaze was drawn to the work desk again. “If that’s the only roadblock, we can certainly arrange your schedule for hobby ti…”

Silently, Harry drew his wand down the right sleeve of his jumper, cutting open the threads and revealing the shiny scarred skin on his arm. It snaked up from the very ends of his fingertips, wrapping around his forearm and up around his bicep like his arm was prey being constricted.

“I don’t trust it,” Harry said. “Not for being an auror. I did what I had to do last year, but I’d like to try living a bit without having to hunt someone down or run for my safety.”

Harry didn’t much like to look at it himself, and once he felt Kingsley had seen enough, he dragged his wand back up his arm, watching as the threads reached out and found their severed mates, knitting the sleeve back together again.

“Sometimes we forget that this has been the focus of your life since you were a child,” Kingsley said, his happy mood subdued by Harry’s arm, “What happened?”

“A curse,” Harry calmly replied, offering nothing more. He didn’t want pity for the last seven years – he’d had his angry moments, his denial, his determined acceptance. But now he was free of the prophecy, and free of the expectation to be the hero.

Before Kingsley could press for further information, the echoed steps of someone walking swiftly up the stairs came to their attention.

“I have not changed my mind,” Snape said, confidently striding through the door. He seemed surprised to find Kingsley there and stopped as soon as he saw him.

“Shacklebolt,” Snape said. 

Kingsley looked between the two and gave a small bow. “My cue to leave. Harry, I’ll have the letters stopped, and if there’s anything I can do, just let me know.”

“Start, Potter, I have places to be,” Snape said, after Kingsley had gone and it was just the two of them.

“Do you?” Harry asked, legitimately curious. He then shook his head to regain his focus. “Regarding yesterday’s conversation, you’re right about hiding. It won’t be a secret for much longer.”

Snape gave him a dubious look, but Harry knew that it didn’t mean Snape wasn’t listening.

“I’m doing an interview with Denis Creevey, for his magazine. Now that the war’s over, it’s time for me to be truthful about who I am, regardless of what they think.”

“How very brave of you,” Snape said, and though there was sarcasm, the comment wasn’t completely so. He seemed to be waiting on Harry, to see what else Harry would say, and it was like the conversations they used to have in Dartmoor once more.

“Look,” Harry continued. “What I’m saying is, give it some time. Don’t…don’t say no and never consider it again. Us.”

“It’s a foolish idea, Harry,” Snape finally said, but his voice was softer, and he looked like he didn’t fully believe himself either.

“I’m good at those, aren’t I?” Harry said, with a depreciating smile. “But maybe we deserve some normality now too.”

Snape nodded, looking slightly annoyed with himself, and drew a small bag out of his pocket. Harry watched with great curiosity as Snape pointed his wand at the bag, shakily pulling a small gift out of it.

“Happy Christmas, Potter,” Snape said.

Harry grinned. He held his wand out and summoned a little box of his own, handing it over. 

“Happy Christmas, Severus.”

Snape tucked the gift under his arm, holding it carefully, and gave Harry a curt nod. 

“Good luck.”

He spun around, his cloak swirling and brushing the doorframe as he left.

Harry locked the door and then immediately opened the box, surprised to find a bottle of custom-brewed finishing oil for wands and woodworking.

He put the gift down, feeling a little better; a bit hopeful that Snape hadn’t fully closed off the idea of them dating. It lasted for a few moments, before the dread of coming out settled in his stomach again.

……

_December 25 th, 1997_

Harry came out of the washroom, keeping his day clothes against his chest as he walked to his side of the bed. The bothy was heated fairly well through the cast iron stove, and he felt fine in just pyjama bottoms. The potion from Madame Pomfrey had arrived earlier that afternoon, disguised mail drop via an owl rescue centre that was ten miles away. Harry thought it tasted just as bad as Skele-grow, and hoped it worked just as quickly.

“Did you say seven, earlier?” Harry asked, rubbing some of the salve on his arm. Snape was sitting on his side of the bed, in pyjamas transfigured to fit him from some of the spare clothes Harry had left there. His right arm seemed to be kept in place against his chest by magic, and he’d also set up a sheet to hang down from the rafter, splitting the bed in half to give privacy.

“I said many things earlier,” Snape evasively told him. He roughly shook his blanket out, barely missing Harry, and seemed to be purposefully avoiding staring at Harry’s bare chest.

“About the horcruxes,” Harry bluntly said. “The only way I can stop this is to destroy them, and then go after him.”

Harry sat on the edge of the bed and drew his legs up, awkwardly crawling to the front of the bed on three limbs.

“If you know that there’s more, you need to tell me. Dumbledore’s not here to demand secrets anymore.”

“This is all still his plan, Potter. Put into action long before your voice dropped,” Snape said. He also had struggled a bit to get into bed, which Harry watched with slight amusement via shadow on the divider sheet.

“I don’t care, Snape,” Harry said. “I’m here in a bothy with you at Christmas. Clearly things aren’t going to anyone’s plan.”

“Much appreciated, Potter,” Snape waspishly said.

“Being headmaster under You Know Who was your plan all along, then,” Harry sarcastically responded.

“It certainly was not,” Snape snapped. “I will consider what to tell you. _Tomorrow_.”

“Fine,” Harry grumbled. He yanked his blanket it up to his chin and closed his eyes.

Thirty minutes later, when Harry rolled over for the 12th time in his unsuccessful bid to fall asleep, he noticed the shadows on the curtain moving. There were no sounds –Harry suspected that Snape had used a silencing spell– but he’d curiously forgotten to do anything about the shadow on the blanket divider.

There wasn’t much light in the bothy at night, and the forest around it prevented much from reaching the windows even when the moon was full. But there was a small light in the bathroom that had been installed by the muggles who’d built it, and that was enough for Harry to see with.

He stared, fascinated, watching the rhythmic movement of one shadowy limb moving up and down, speed fairly steady. There was no doubt what it was, and Harry’s mind raced as he thought: was it Snape’s fix for insomnia? For clarify of thought? Or…because Harry had been shirtless earlier?

The arm sped up and Harry couldn’t look away, willing himself not to move lest Snape hear him and stop. His own erection pushed against the fabric of his pyjamas, hopefully unnoticeable under his blankets. Snape was unnaturally silent, most certainly a spell had been cast, and Harry could see his rhythm becoming more erratic the closer he was to coming, before finally he did.

Harry stayed painfully still for the next few moments as Snape manoeuvred to get out of the bed and move to the washroom. His mind was replaying the shadow show over and over, and Harry barely waited for the door to close before shoving his hand down his trousers. It took an embarrassingly short time to come; masturbation was something he partook of fairly often but usually with stimulus that was made up in his own mind. This was far more enticing, and Harry only managed to swallow his groan at the last second when he orgasmed.

A weaker clean up spell than he liked with his left hand mostly sorted everything, and though he knew his brain would be replaying _that_ for a while longer, Harry quickly pretended to be asleep when Snape came back out of the washroom. 


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work is still busy, which is why these are about once every 7 or 8 days. I do finish my stories though, fear not that it won't be finished.

_December 25 th, 1998_

His paper hat was blue this year, and though he still flinched at the cannon-like sounds the Christmas crackers made, Harry had a grin on his face and a warm cup of mulled wine in his hand. He’d dreamed about this last year, Christmas at the Burrow, with no more war on their minds. Music and food and laughter, though in Harry’s dreams from last year there were a few more people in attendance.

Still, Percy was there, Charlie had come home from Romania, Bill and Fleur were chatting with Ginny and Neville, and Fred’s portrait was sitting atop a few books at his place, so he could see everyone. Mr and Mrs Granger were sitting next to Harry, much more relaxed than they had been upon first being brought to the Burrow by Ron and Hermione. They were still looking around at all the marvels of the Weasley home, and flinching a little when magic happened right in front of them. Harry understood the wonder; he’d absolutely fallen in love with the Burrow when he’d first visited, and it had never lost its charm.

“Pass the pud, Harry,” George said, holding his hand out. He was wearing a pink hat, which did not match either his hair or his new jumper, but like everyone else at the table didn’t much care.

“How are your NEWT courses going, dear?” Molly asked, sending the hard sauce down toward George, for the Christmas pudding. It floated past the Grangers, who watched it with interest.

“They’re all right,” Harry said, cutting himself a large slice of treacle tart for his plate. “I’ve done the potion already, and I don’t need to do the defensive work. Next up is transfiguration, I think.”

“That was one of my favourite subjects,” Molly said. She pointed her wand up at her head and transfigured her green paper Christmas cracker hat into a silvery crown with green and red gems.

“Transfiguration is magic that turns one object into another,” Hermione said, her voice low as she leaned toward her parents to give an explanation.

“I’m all right at it, I think,” Harry said. He picked up some of the paper wrappings from the crackers and transfigured them into tiny coloured beads.

“And how is Severus?” Arthur asked, pouring some more mulled wine into his glass. “It’s been a while since I’ve seen him, he keeps to himself a lot.”

“Our potions professor,” Hermione murmured.

“He does,” Harry said. The Christmas music in the background had switched to a classic muggle radio station, playing songs that Harry had grown up listening to every December. Mr Granger started humming along, pleased that he recognised the music.

It was warm and cosy in the room, Christmas dinner heavy in their stomachs as everyone chatted at the table and absentmindedly played with the cracker prizes.

“He’s okay,” Harry continued, not sure what else to say. “Not as angry as he was last year, or during Hogwarts in general.”

“Really?” Bill said. “Hard to imagine old Snape being nice.”

Harry smiled to himself and rolled one of his tiny beads under his finger.

“He’s not actually that old,” Harry said.

“Not that nice, either,” Ginny said, with a smirk. Neville smiled, but shook his head a little.

“You know, I think he’s all right. Became pretty obvious in the end how he was tricking the Carrows.”

“He was helpful when I needed him to be,” Harry said, shrugging. 

“Neville was the true genius though, with how he made the Room of Requirement work,” Ginny said, and the look of adoration she gave Neville was evident to all at the table. Fred made a puking face in his portrait, which thankfully Neville didn’t notice. The tale of how Neville had outsmarted everyone and made the Room of Requirement bend to his every whim was shared again, for the benefit of any who hadn’t heard it.

Mrs Granger leaned over during a lull in the conversation and pointed to the paper that Percy was reading.

“If I may ask, why are you on the front page of that newspaper?” she said.

Percy turned it over in his hand to check, as if he’d not noticed at all that Harry was on the front page. It wasn’t a great set of photos, one of Harry going into Ollivander’s, and a second of the screened-out windows Harry had caused.

“Harry’s famous,” Charlie said, returning to the table from the bathroom. “ _Prophet’s_ still a rag though, isn’t it?”

“There’s some truth to it,” Arthur said. He turned to the Grangers and explained further. “That’s the daily paper in our world. They usually report on Ministry activity and daily events, though they can be a little sensational.”

“That’s the paper that kept talking about Harry and I dating when we were younger,” Hermione said, rolling her eyes. “They’re heavily influenced by the Ministry and often print falsehoods just as much as truths.”

“So young Harry here might not be famous,” Mr Granger said, his tone just dry enough to convey his teasing tone.

“Whatever I am,” Harry said, nodding at the paper, “they’re interested enough to follow me around for a story.”

He rolled some of the melted candle wax that had dripped onto the table into a long, thin string with his hand.

“ _Potter in Harsh Negotiations,”_ Mrs Granger read.“What do they think you’re negotiating?”

“The purchase of that shop,” Harry said. “Or the competition against? I’ve not read that particular article.”

“This is that wand fixing hobby you’ve got?” Bill asked. Harry nodded, and smiled when George pulled his wand out to show off Harry’s work.

“Skeeter was trailing me through the Alley,” Harry said with a shrug, spearing a piece of treacle with his fork. “I expected her to, and knew she’d follow me there. She can write about that all she wants, it’s not true.”

“That’s brilliant,” Ron said. “Keeps her from finding out other stuff you don’t want to share.”

“You’ve got loads of secrets, do you Harry?” George asked, tipping his wine glass toward Harry.

“Sort of,” Harry said, coughing slightly. He had everyone’s attention, but it was a calm focus, and quite unlike the years before when he’d shared things and only upped the concern of everyone in the room. He’d planned to come out to the family, perhaps not when the Grangers were there as well, but it was something he’d wanted to do over Christmas. He’d even practised what he was going to say in the shower, but none of the words were coming to him now.

“I’m doing an interview with Denis Creevey, for his magazine,” Harry started. Both Arthur and Molly were smiling at him, and Harry felt some comfort from that. He also knew that Ron and Hermione fully supported him, but the rest of the Weasleys he couldn’t quite figure out how they’d react.

“I’m coming out in the magazine. That’s what I don’t want Rita Skeeter to find out first.”

Hermione’s smile softened. During their year of camping together she’d gained an edge of subtleness with her care and support, which Harry really appreciated.

“Where are you going, love?” Molly asked, leaning forward with a bit of excitement and eagerness. 

Out of the corner of his eye Harry could see that Ron had his head down and was clearly trying not to laugh.

“No, I mean I’m gay, Molly. That’s how the muggles say it, they come out of the closet,” Harry clarified.

“Oh! Yes, well I knew that,” Molly said. She turned to Arthur and gave him a happy but slightly bemused look. “Did you know they say that? Why are they in a closet?”

“I think the closet is metaphorical,” Mr Granger explained. “But good for you, Harry.”

“Huh,” Charlie said. He sipped his mulled wine and looked past Harry as he digested that. 

“That’s big news, Harry,” Bill said, his face kind as he relaxed in his seat and slung his arm over the back of Fleur’s chair. “Not an easy thing to reveal.”

“Yes,” Fleur added, giving him a warm smile. “I hope it goes well for you.”

“Like, rather be with a bloke?” Charlie asked, with a puzzled look.

“Yeah,” Harry said. The anxiety that had settled ever so slightly once he’d said the words was growing back with ferocity.

“I think that’s the whole point,” George said, his voice even as he spoke directly at his brother. Ginny was glaring at Charlie, and looking like she was itching to say something.

“Sure, yeah,” Charlie nodded, taking another sip. He didn’t say anything else, but Harry suspected Charlie wasn’t done.

“We’ve one at the Ministry,” Percy said, offhandedly. “He hasn’t really told many people, but everyone knows.”

Harry pursed his lips in a straight line and nodded.

“You’re not really like him,” Percy added, talking to Harry as if this was a compliment.

“We’re not all alike, no,” Harry said. He knew he sounded short, but was trying to keep in his temper.

An uncomfortable silence descended on the table, and Harry started rolling the wax again, concentrating on making it thin and even. Mrs Granger asked Molly about how her clock worked, and the conversation started up again.

Harry pulled his wand out of his pocket and aimed it at the wax, muttering a transformation charm. It darkened and thinned out further into a piece of leather, snaking around his plate and spearing the rainbow-coloured beads Harry had made.

The music continued to play and talk moved to the subject of muggle and wizarding Christmas traditions, with Arthur looking delighted to find how many similarities there were. Harry could tell that he was still being watched, Arthur glancing at him once in a while to see how he was doing, but done subtle enough that it didn’t break the conversation with the Grangers. He appreciated it, but still felt like his happy mood from earlier had been deflated, and more and more he just wanted to go home and burrow in his couch blanket nest.

Harry pushed his chair back and shoved the beaded leather string into his pocket as he stood. Most of the plates had been picked over enough that no one was really eating anymore, so Harry set them to float over to the kitchen, using his wand to navigate. Mrs Granger smiled as her plate neatly rose and joined the queue.

“I’ll help,” Ron said, setting the glasses to go and following Harry to the kitchen. George joined them, clapping Harry on the back as he dropped an unused pile of napkins on the windowsill.

“He’s been away a while,” George said. “Maybe too long.”

“It’s fine,” Harry said, not looking at either of them and instead paying more attention than necessary to ensuring the plates stacked nicely on the worktop. “This is part of the gay experience. The hatred.”

“It’s not really hatred,” George said, “Charlie’s not like that. Doesn’t think before speaking and he’s always been a bit awkward.”

Bill came into the kitchen and dropped off the gravy and serving spoons. “We’re all guilty of that sometimes, but it’s not an excuse.”

“It sort of is though,” Harry said, answering George. He was going to say something else, but Charlie came into the kitchen just then, to the sounds of laughter from the dining table.

“Here’s the mince,” Charlie said, putting the plate of mince pies next to Harry and grinning as if he’d made a joke. It didn’t land with anyone in the room.

“Right. As per my last,” Harry said, as Ron made a face and Bill punched Charlie’s arm. He’d been having a nice dinner and evening, and now was itching to leave. If this was what it was like with Charlie, he was reconsidering that he’d ever come out to anyone else.

“Don’t be an arse,” Bill said. “Harry’s gone through a lot and he’s just told us something really personal.”

“It’s a bit weird though isn’t it? Telling us that?” Charlie asked, looking around. “I spend months with the guys at the dragon reserve. Couldn’t imagine wanting to spend even more time with just one of them.”

“Neither can I,” Harry said. He moved to the back kitchen door, where the coats were hanging, brushing past Ron.

“Just you, Charlie,” Ron barked. “You’re the only one here making it weird. If you don’t like it, go back to the bloody dragons.”

“Fuck off, Charlie,” Fred said, pointing his finger at his brother through the portrait. He’d been bouncing through portraits to keep up with the action.

“Fred,” Molly warned from the table. “The swearing is unnecessary.”

“Charlie’s being a twat,” George called, from the kitchen.

“All right all right,” Charlie said, holding his hands up in defeat. “I don’t have a problem with it, I just don’t get it. That’s all I’m saying. Thanks for sharing, Harry.”

“Yeah,” Harry said. “I think I’m going to go home.”

“You don’t need to leave, Harry,” Bill told him.

“I’m all Christmas’d out,” Harry lied. He called his goodbyes to Molly and Arthur and the Grangers. “Say happy Christmas to Hermione for me.”

“Yeah, right,” Ron said, yelling to Hermione that he’d be back and following Harry out the door.

Harry couldn’t apparate into his own flat, but rather the downstairs lobby, and he was relieved to find it empty. He’d just managed to get to his own door at the top of the stairs when he heard the faint crack of another apparition.

“Don’t listen to his opinion,” Ron said, bursting through the door a few seconds later. Harry knew he was coming, and had just sat down on the couch. 

“He spends all his time with a rough crowd and they probably all talk this rubbish.”

“He’s not the only one though, Ron,” Harry said, unfolding one of the blankets and piling it on himself. He was still wearing his good Christmas dinner outfit, and debated with himself if it was worth trying to transfigure his dress trousers to lounge ones. “There’ll be other who react just the same, or worse.”

“Maybe,” Ron said, sitting down next to Harry. “Maybe it won’t be a big deal.”

“It will be,” Harry said. “Wizards are still old fashioned. Muggles are a little less so and they still beat the shit out of gay people sometimes.”

Fred popped into his portrait for a second, looking a bit breathless.

“Mum’s tearing Charlie a new one,” he told them. “And your old lady said to stay as long as you need.”

He disappeared again, just missing the balled-up paper that Ron threw at the picture frame.

“Hope he doesn’t call her that in person,” Ron said. “Won’t go down well at all.”

Harry huffed a small, humourless laugh. He picked up the remote and flicked on the television, leaving the sound low.

“Did the muggles ever try it?”

“To attack? Yeah,” Harry said, with a shrug. “Luke and I were threatened a few times when we went out.”

“Huh,” Ron said, sitting back against the couch.

“That’s part of the point of this,” Harry explained, tossing the remote to the coffee table, _It’s a Wonderful Life_ playing on tv. “I don’t exactly want the entire wizarding world to know my sexual preference. It’s none of their bloody business. But they’re going to find out and they’re going to make a big deal of it and I need to get through that.”

“Because otherwise you’d have to live in secret for the rest of your life,” Ron said, his brows furrowed as he tried to follow Harry’s steps. “And you can’t date people when you’re keeping this secret.”

“You definitely can. It happens a lot in the muggle world, and probably here too,” Harry patiently said.

“That’s…yeah,” Ron said, scratching his chin. “I can’t think of any gay wizards I know.”

“Because we hide,” Harry said. “It’s fear. And once you say it, you can’t take it back.”

Silence settled over them, Ron clearly still thinking it over, as on tv George Baily was pleading with Henry Potter for help. Harry flexed his sore hand in the blanket folds, working out the dull ache. He pulled the beaded leather out of his pocket with his other hand and draped it around his wrist, concentrating enough on wandless magic to make it connect together, much like a bracelet Harry had once seen a few years earlier.

“ _We_ ,” Ron repeated. He had an expression on his face that Harry recognised from their chess games, the ones that Harry very often lost.

“I assume there’s more than just myself,” Harry said, attempting nonchalance.

“Harry,” Ron said, calling him out on his evasiveness. “You hate the papers. But you’re going to a magazine to willingly do this? So quickly after coming back? Who is he?”

Harry bit his lip and debated how he was going to answer that. It had been a running joke through the years by many that Hermione had been the brightest of their group, but Harry felt that had unfairly knocked Ron down a few pegs. Ron was a fantastic strategist, and could often think ahead of Harry’s actions to see what the end goal was. Even when Harry didn’t want him to.

“We’re not dating. Not yet,” Harry quietly said. Ron nodded, and Harry saw his mistake a few seconds too late. He was too relaxed in the blanket, and Ron had longer arms anyway, so when the torn gift wrap was noticed on the coffee table, Harry had no chance of snatching it up before Ron did.

“For your future successes,” Ron read out, off the pristine card he’d untangled from the crumpled paper. “Severus.”

Harry could feel how red his face had become, and empathized with George Bailey on the television, who was standing on the bridge and contemplating jumping into the river.

It hadn’t been that long since Snape had been a hated professor of Ron, nor was it that long since Snape had accidentally cursed George’s ear off, or oversaw the cruelty of the Carrows at Hogwarts. From what Harry knew, Snape had kept mostly to himself since the war, and there had been no opportunity for Ron to know him in any other capacity.

“Severus,” Ron repeated, looking from the note to Harry.

“He’s different than you remember,” Harry quietly said.

“Yeah, clearly,” Ron laughed, but the humour was missing from his tone. “Severus Snape.”

“Severus Snape,” Harry repeated. “Nothing’s started yet, but I want the chance to see if something could.”

He’d had a shite end to the evening, and though he was feeling like he’d already been kicked around, Harry stuck his chin out in defiance. Ron was his best mate, but they’d definitely had some strong arguments before and Harry knew they’d do it again. He felt like he could be happy with Severus, possible, and he wasn’t going to let people stand in the way of him trying.

“All right,” Ron said, making Harry suspicious. Ron leaned forward and grabbed Fred’s portrait, knocking four times on the frame.

“What?” Fred said, sticking his head in on the diagonal.

“Can you send Hermione over?” Ron asked, glancing at Harry. “Maybe with some of the mulled wine.”

“I’m not your messenger,” Fred grumbled, giving Ron a two-fingered salute. They did hear him shout Hermione’s name as he walked out of the frame, however.

“Wine?” Harry asked, giving Ron a wary look. He’d been preparing himself for a shouting match, not drinks.

“Look, I’m not exactly pleased at the idea of it being Snape. He’s absolutely nothing like Luke. And I can’t picture him being that nice,” Ron said. “But you wouldn’t try this just for a laugh.”

“I don’t exactly find my dating situation that funny,” Harry said.

“Right,” Ron said. “So, we watch this muggle movie and wait for Hermione to get here. And then you can explain what’s going on.”

“Nothing’s going on. I’m not dating him,” Harry pointed out, to which Ron rolled his eyes.

“Fine, then why you trust him so much, or what happened last year at the bothy. Why he thinks so highly of you to get you a Christmas gift. Take your pick.”

Harry scowled at Ron, who’d crossed his arms triumphantly.

“Mate, we’ve got your back on this. But we haven’t seen him outside of school or the war, so if we’re going to defend and support, show us why he’s more than just the arsehole spy in the dungeon.”

“This might be easier if we had a pensieve,” Harry said with a sigh, just as Hermione walked through the door.

……

_December 26 th, 1997_

“Been a while since you’ve been in the dorms,” Harry said, standing at the sink and attempting to wash his mug. 

Snape was staring at him from his side of the bed, having just woken up, hair curtained in front of his face.

“Excuse me?” Snape silkily said.

“Last night,” Harry said, accidentally smacking the edge of the sink with his mug. He still hadn’t turned around, but could feel the intensity of Snape’s glare.

“Potter, you’d better be very careful with what you say next,” Snape warned.

“I’d better be careful?” Harry asked, spinning around and facing Snape. “I’m not the one who forgot all the privacy spells. You’ve been in my _head_ ; you know what I am…”

“I would say we are fairly even on that point,” Snape snapped back. “Unless you have conveniently forgotten all of my private information that no other student has?”

“I stopped being just any other student when he returned,” Harry bluntly said. “And I have never shared what I know.”

Snape stood up and walked over to the worktop, picking up the nerve-healing potion and flicking off the cork with surprising ease for his left hand.

“Not even to Granger and Weasley?” Snape asked, pouring a measure into a little cup that was on the worktop. “I doubt that.”

He swished the potion around in the cup and downed it all. Harry remained silent, and Snape narrowed his eyes.

“No. They don’t know about me yet, either,” Harry finally said. 

Snape’s expression fully displayed how truthful he thought that was.

“Not that it matters right now anyway,” Harry continued. “Not a lot of dating or sex when you’re on the run in the middle of a giant war.”

He picked up the bottle that Snape had left uncapped and poured himself his own measure, grimacing at the potion.

“Yes, well, some of us came to that conclusion a lot sooner,” Snape said. He stalked past Harry to the bathroom, the domineering effect slightly less effective as he was still in pyjamas and barefoot. “I prefer not to take sleeping potions.”

Harry downed the medicine and grimaced, bracing for the burning to start again through his arm. The nerves were regrowing, but at a slow pace that Harry wasn’t fully pleased with.

The bathroom door unexpectedly whipped open again, and Harry almost dropped the stopper he was trying to put in the potion bottle.

“We are here only as long as we need to be for the potion to work, Potter. Nothing more. It is dangerous enough that we are disadvantaged, but in the same room for this long is a concerning risk. We are, perhaps, two of the most important people in this war, and after this, you will go back to assuming I am the enemy.”

“I’m aware. I’ve plenty of practise at that,” Harry said, sipping some water to get rid of the potion taste. “But I have appreciated your information drops.”

Snape looked like he was about to say something else, but didn’t quite know how to take Harry’s thanks, so just gave an awkward nod and shut the door again.

_What a mess_ , Harry thought, kneeling down to add more wood to the stove. The bothy was warm enough, but he knew with the potion starting to work on their arms that any chill in the air would make the pain worse. But he couldn’t imagine having to deal with this curse on his own. Hermione may have been able to stop it, or maybe not, but she would have done her best. Would it have been enough? Or would it have permanently disabled him in such a dangerous time of the war?

Sheer dumb luck, he had, that’s what McGonagall had told him a few times before. Dumb luck that he’d ended up here with Snape, and dumb luck that he’d found that potion recipe card at Grimmauld Place at all.

But it wasn’t luck, Harry admitted to himself. Not really. He sat on the bed and stared out the window. Snape had known Harry would find it, known that Harry would look for any mementos of Sirius or his parents, and that Harry would recognise the potion card being out of place. Would recognise the writing on it. There was of course the chance that Snape was setting him up, playing a very long game. Harry knew that, but also knew he wouldn’t survive if he tripled guessed everyone, and Snape’s information via the recipe card had not only been helpful over the last few months, but also accurate every time. 

As much of an arse as he tended to be, Snape seemed to be a man of his word, when he’d decided on a course to take.

Harry’s eyes went slightly out of focus as he remembered a hot summer day, happy noise echoing all around him in a crowd of people, an impossibly tight blue shirt with wiry muscled arms, light grey jeans, intense stare as–

“Potter,” Snape said, standing in the doorway of the bathroom. He was wearing one of Harry’s shirts, instead of his long-sleeved wizarding one, with his sleek black trousers, and seemed to know exactly what Harry was thinking.

“I will be training outside. Separation may be key to continuing our roles as enemies.”

“Right,” Harry said, coughing slightly to cover the roughness of his voice. 

……

“Hedwig,” Snape said, fiddling with the dial on the wireless. He didn’t ask about the password, and Harry wondered for a second if Snape knew that that had been the name of his owl. Probably, Harry thought. Snape knew far more than Harry usually realised.

The mood of the radio broadcast when it loaded was sombre, no music, no chatter, just Lee saying hello. Harry immediately leaned in toward the radio, dread filling his stomach.

“There’s not much to broadcast today,” Lee said, and his voice was breaking. “It’s River, here, just by myself.”

“No,” Harry said. He reached out to grab the radio but Snape stopped him, before Harry accidentally switched the dial.

“This morning there was a Death Eater raid in a village not far from here,” Lee continued. “I won’t say where here was, but you may or may not read about it in the _Prophet_. Several muggles were attacked, and in the process of defending them, we lost one of our own.”

Silence again, and Harry blinked his eyes rapidly, pushing back tears and shaking his head.

“It’s still important, very important, that we must continue to fight and protect our neighbours, protect ourselves. We will win.”

“Good bye, Fred,” Lee finally managed, before his half sob was swallowed by radio static.

“NO,” Harry shouted. He pushed away from the table and stood up, not even caring that he’d knocked over his chair. Not Fred. No. _They could not have lost one of the Weasleys_. He moved to the sink and then shook his head, unsure of whether he was going to be sick or not.

“No no no,” Harry said, slamming his fist down on the worktop. His right arm flailed and hit the edge near the sink, causing an explosion of pain to radiate from his bicep up into his shoulder, where the nerves had started to regenerate.

“Potter,” Snape said, coming toward him.

“No!” Harry shouted, pulling his wand and pointing it at Snape. “This is your fault!”

Snape held his good hand up, slowing his approach.

“He shouldn’t have died, it should only have been me,” Harry said, his breath catching as he started to sob. He crumpled to the floor, dropping his wand and landing with his legs folded underneath him. Harry dug frantically in his pocket for his DA coin, unable to see much through his tears. “I need to see them; I need to go.”

“You can’t,” Snape said. He was standing near Harry and knelt down. “That’s exactly what the Dark Lord wants you to do.”

Harry fumbled with the DA coin, pressing it a few times and not managing to get much of a message working. He finally dropped it in frustration.

“I don’t care, I’m going,” Harry snapped, except his arm didn’t work and he couldn’t get off the floor, and it just made him angrier. Images flew through his head, Fred and George breaking him out of Privet drive, on the quidditch team, giving him the marauder’s map, of breakfasts and dinners at the Burrow. Things he’d never get to experience with them again. Things George could only ever do alone now.

“Harry,” Snape said, kneeing on the floor and awkwardly pulling Harry to him. Snape smelled of muggle department store deodorant and cheap 2 in 1 shampoo that Harry had stocked the bathroom with. His chest was surprisingly warm, and Harry fought the embrace for a second before collapsing into it.

“None of them were supposed to die,” Harry said, his voice partially muffled by Snape’s shirt, and broken by hiccoughs. Harry stayed that way, shaking as he tried to regulate his breathing and stop the tears from coming. He knew it wasn’t just Fred, knew that he was crying for the boy who’d lost his parents, his mentor, his friends. For the boy who was tired of everything.

Snape’s arm stayed around him, a strong source of warmth and steadiness as Harry worked through the shock. The little bothy was silent, save for the cracking of wood in the stove, and Harry’s uneven breathing.

“Stay where you are,” Hermione’s voice suddenly said, and Harry raised his head from where it was buried against Snape. Her otter patronus was on the floor next to them, front feet on Snape’s thigh as if trying to get to Harry. “Ron is safe, stay hidden.”

Harry shook his head, his desire to run and go find his friends building again.

“She is correct,” Snape said. He let Harry go and awkwardly stood up, using the chair next to him as a brace. “Mourning can be done when it is safe.”

Harry nodded, and turned away. He knew Hermione was right, but he felt so disconnected and lonely that he was sorely tempted to defy safety and go to the Burrow anyway. And he knew that if Snape wasn’t there, he would have.

Harry spent twenty minutes in the bathroom, having a proper fit of anger and tears under a silencing spell that prevented Snape from hearing him. He suspected his actions weren’t exactly that secretive though, as once he left the bathroom Snape had wordlessly handed him an anti-headache potion.

“Tomorrow,” Snape said, sitting on his side of the bed with a book in hand, “we will discuss the next steps.”

“I thought we were to remain enemies,” Harry sullenly said, rubbing his eyes. They’d gone slightly itchy from the tears, and Harry knew drinking water would help but he stubbornly didn’t want to. “Too dangerous for us to both know everything.”

He climbed onto his own side, collecting the blankets he was using and creating a nest around himself.

“Have you any idea why I took the role of headmaster?” Snape asked, opening the book he’d chosen.

“No,” Harry muttered, pushing back and wiping his eyes with his sleeve. “I assume either Dumbledore or You Know Who ordered you.”

“Both,” Snape said. “I am there to give the appearance of the Dark Lord’s control over the school, whilst doing my utmost to ensure the students do not come to grievous harm.”

“The Forbidden Forest,” Harry said, stretching his leg out as he sat against the wall. “You’ve been sending them to the Forbidden Forest as punishment.”

It was still a terrifying place to be, Ron had been correct about that. But Snape had been sending them with Hagrid, doing the best he could to mitigate the punishment in the background.

“Yes,” Snape said. He was on his side of the bed, also using the wall as a back rest, and didn’t move his leg when Harry’s landed alongside his. “Control of the school is key.”

“It was the place he considered home,” Harry said, shrugging. He didn’t really have the energy to talk much about strategy. Didn’t really care any more.

“Correct. There is information that must remain confidential until the right time,” Snape said, “but I believe some shared sooner will be of aid to end the war faster.”

“Don’t wait too long,” Harry said. He’d picked up a note pad to write on while he waited for his headache to go away. “I know I’m going to die in the end.”

Snape’s hand stilled on his own book, and he glanced up at Harry. He looked like a professor asking a student to confirm just how wrong they were.

“What, exactly, do you think you know?”

“It’s been in the prophecy the whole time,” Harry tonelessly replied. “Either must die at the hand of the other, for neither can live while the other survives. And you confirmed it yourself yesterday. Seven.”

He tossed the notepad to the side of the bed and slid down, so he was laying on the mattress. Exhaustion was creeping in, and Harry didn’t feel like fighting it. He couldn’t stop thinking of Fred, of George and Ron, of how he ached to be with the family right now. And the fear of them hating him because closeness to him brought this death upon them.

“It’s something I’ve suspected for a while now,” Harry said, pulling up the blankets around him like a protective shell.


	8. Chapter 8

“This is not one of your smarter ideas,” Hermione muttered, slipping past the grumpy gargoyle and going up the stairs to the Headmistress’s office.

“Where else are you going to get a pensieve on Christmas?” Ron hissed back.

Harry popped the door open and led them into the office, which was a lot less cluttered than it had been in Dumbledore’s time.

“I don’t know, come back during the day so we’re not breaking in?” Hermione replied.

“We’re not breaking in,” Harry interjected, his voice regular volume instead of a whisper. “The gargoyle let us in. Technically we just snuck onto school grounds.”

“I sort of miss it,” Ron said, grinning. Hermione rolled her eyes at him, but then offered a small smile of agreement. 

Harry opened the cabinet with the pensieve and drew it out, placing it on a stand in the middle of the office so they all had room to gather around it.

“I’ve only done this spell once, during the trials after the war, so the memories might get cut off at the wrong spot,” Harry said. He put his wand to his head and drew several threads of memories out, swishing them down to the bowl. “Don’t comment on anything till we’re back at mine, the portraits here are nosy.”

Harry glanced up as he said that, and saw several portraits reacting to that statement. Some appeared insulted, some chastised, and Dumbledore just winked before going back to sleep.

“Here we go,” Harry muttered, leaning forward with Ron and Hermione to enter the memories.

The swirling memory turned into bright sky and light grey clouds as they passed through, landing with a soft thump on dirty tile flooring, beside memory Harry who was quickly moving in the crowd.

The whistling and cheering echoed down the stairs as memory Harry made his way out of the tube station, wincing in the bright light that shadowed Big Ben. The chants were louder now, colourful flashes passing by as people walked from the bridge to the parade route. Harry walked along the wall, slinking through the crowd, reading some of the signs as he passed. He was dressed as a regular muggle and blended in, though the light on his arm from the night in the cemetery a few weeks earlier caught a few glances as he walked down the street.

“Hey hey, ho ho!” the crowd shouted, anger raising the volume. Harry turned the corner and walked toward Downing Street.

“28 has got to go!”

He felt plain, in jeans and a t-shirt, and didn’t know where was appropriate to look. There were a huge variety of people out, with a dizzying array of glitter and feathers floating through the air. Men in nothing but underpants, women in leather, drag queens with the tallest heels he’d ever seen. Harry was sure he was staring, and realised that this was likely what muggles felt like when they encountered wizards. He watched the middle of the parade, looking at a tall slender man, shirtless and in royal purple skin tight bottoms. He carried a sign with a photo of Margaret Thatcher on it, devil horns drawn on and a scrawled ‘Screw Thatcher’ underneath. The man was gazing back and forth through the crowd, and Harry looked away to avoid catching his gaze.

He wasn’t the only one to be staying back in the shadows, and Harry froze as they made accidental eye contact. Across the street, watching from a nearly identical alcove to his own, was Severus Snape. Not the Snape of Hogwarts, the imposing wizard with miles of robes and consistently stern look, but rather a muggle-ised version, light grey jeans, plain blue shirt, and his hair still long but tied back.

“Shit,” Harry muttered, having lost all interest in remaining at the parade. It had taken him two hours to convince himself to go, and now he was kicking himself for doing it.

“Leaving already?” Snape hissed, having suddenly apparated and blocking Harry’s path.

“You can’t apparate in front of muggles,” Harry said, glaring up at Snape. “Sir.”

“Today of all days they’ll never notice,” Snape immediately answered. “Why are you here, Potter.”

It was a statement more than a question, and Harry bristled. He pushed against Snape, trying to leave, but Snape caught his shirt and held him in place.

“What does it matter?” Harry said. “It’s a public event and I don’t have to explain why I came to see it.”

The grip softened slightly, and Harry glanced down to Snape’s wrist, where there was a thin beaded rainbow bracelet, the only thing that gave away that Snape was there as more than just as curious bystander. Snape noticed him staring and the tendon of his arm flexed, but there was no long sleeve to cover it up.

“Why does it matter? The Dark Lord has just returned and you decide to galivant to London. And of all places to stand, you happened to be across the street from myself,” Snape growled.

“Are you okay, honey?”

A lesbian couple, looking very butch with black shirts with rolled up sleeves, buzzed short hair, and jeans with braces, had turned around from the parade and were watching them closely.

“Yeah,” Harry said, nodding. “Yeah, we... know each other.”

“All right then, you be good.”

One turned back around to watch the parade, but the other watched for a few seconds longer, hand on her hip.

“Fuck section 28!” the crowd yelled, breaking some of the tension.

Snape nodded at the woman, his fist still gripping Harry’s shirt. He looked younger than he did in school, but then finding Snape in the muggle world, dressed as a muggle, was something Harry never thought he’d ever see.

“I didn’t want to see someone I knew. I’d rather you not go around spreading the news either, sir,” Harry said, “no matter what the particular motivation I had to be here.”

Snape tilted his head a little, his eyes dark and focused and making Harry uncomfortable. The parade carried on loudly around them but Harry was trapped, watching as Snape studied him.

“It’s a very lonely life, Potter,” Snape said finally said, his tone odd and quiet. He seemed to have realised that Harry had only run into him by honest accident.

“Be sure it’s what you want.”

He let go of Harry’s shirt and stepped back, disapparating before Harry could process the sentence. Harry pulled his shirt down and looked across the street again, but didn’t see Snape. All of his excitement about going out had immediately drained, and Harry watched the people go by, feeling like he belonged in the shadows where he stood.

A swirl of mist swallowed up the sounds of the parade and the next scene was months later, Harry in his invisibility cloak in the hallway outside of Snape’s office. Umbridge was in the office, her mock friendly high voice carrying through the door as he eavesdropped.

“Surely you have something,” she said, in a tone that conveyed that she thought she was right, “I know you’re not exactly fond of the boy.”

“I am not fond of any of the students,” Snape blandly replied. Harry shifted his position a little, and Snape could be seen through the gap of the door, sitting at his desk and looking bored.

“Hem hem,” she said, clicking her tongue. “Perhaps I shall put my request in a different format to ensure you understand. I need to make certain that the boy obeys every decree I set. Any particular information you may have to assist that is immediately required.”

A second ticked by as Snape stared at her with an impassive face.

“I understood your request. There is no such information.”

The dungeon disappeared before Umbridge’s reply was heard, and they were catapulted a few years ahead, to the bothy. Harry and Snape sitting silently on the bed, sheet hanging between them, as they covered their arms with the pain-relieving salve. It swirled to the next scene, Harry on the floor leaning against Snape, Hermione’s patronus telling him that Ron was safe.

The memory was short and cut quickly, as if Harry didn’t want to spend a lot of time reliving the moment he’d found out about Fred. The next memory was still in the bothy, with Harry laying on the floor on his stomach, giant hand drawn map of Hogwarts laid out. Stacks of note paper were skewed about beside him, knickknacks from the bothy representing different elements of the castle. A cup of coffee was in the middle, where the Great Hall was.

“The seven passages have been blocked,” Snape said, leaning against the worktop with his own cup of coffee in his left hand. He, much like Harry, was wearing plaid pyjama trousers with a t-shirt, and was in stocking feet. It was clear they’d been in the bothy a while.

“I don’t think those are the only ways into Hogwarts,” Harry said. He was propped up on his arms, but it was obvious that the right one was only just supporting him and not able to do anything else. “But noted. I think there’s at least one, maybe two things I’m looking for.”

“The castle has many hiding spaces,” Snape said, somewhat sarcastically. “It would help if you knew _what_ you were looking for.”

Harry moved his coffee cup to a room off the side of the library, and drew a line from the seventh-floor corridor toward Ravenclaw’s tower.

“Not that way,” Snape said, nudging Harry’s leg with his foot. “That area is monitored heavily.”

Harry nodded and scribbled out his writing. “Once I’ve destroyed them, I’d rather the battle be outside; less damage to Hogwarts that way.”

“The castle will self-repair,” Snape said, not sounding too bothered about destruction. He also understood that this would be the final battle.

“Does it really?” Harry asked, looking up in surprise. “Huh.”

“Will any of your mystery items be in the Shrieking Shack?” Snape asked, nodding at the scrunched up green napkin that was serving as a tree on the map.

“Doubt it,” Harry said. “It’ll probably be something from each of the founders.”

He tapped the pen on his chin as he studied the map.

“Are any of the ghosts related to the founders, Severus?”

“Pardon?” Snape said, still leaning relaxed against the worktop.

“The ghosts,” Harry repeated, still tapping his chin as he looked down.

“The _name_ ,” Snape clarified. Harry looked up at him with a daring expression.

“We’re adults planning the final stages of a war that will likely kill me,” Harry pointed out.

Snape looked slightly annoyed, but didn’t counter.

“I believe the Grey Lady may be of assistance in this case,” Snape said. “ _Harry_.”

“Brilliant,” Harry said, ignoring Snape’s tone. “So possibly the room of requirement, and then find the Grey Lady. And once they’re all done… I don’t know if I’ll know. I don’t know if I’ll be missing anything.”

“You should consider the snake,” Snape quietly said. “Albus specifically mentioned that you will know what to do once the snake is guarded.”

“That’s news to me,” Harry muttered. He took a few more terribly-written notes and then struggled to sit up, given that his right arm still refused to mostly support him.

“This will do for now,” Snape said. “Once you have confirmation on locations within the castle you can send them through the potion card.”

“Sure,” Harry said, dusting off his pyjamas as he stood. Snape still looked relaxed, but also satisfied with what they’d discussed. Harry almost felt bad that he was about to ruin it.

“What do you know of the Deathly Hallows, by the way?”

The map became blurry and the scene changed, to Harry lying in bed and staring up the bothy’s ceiling. The sheet dividing the bed was missing, and even though all the lights were out, Snape was clearly visible, not that far away.

“I must die,” Harry said, his voice slightly rough. The silence in the room was not a comfortable one.

“Yes,” Snape finally answered. The bothy was quite warm from the fire still, and they were both laying on top of the blankets.

“All this training, all this searching, it’s been so I can die, at the right time and in the right way.”

“I thought you’d suspected this for a while,” Snape sardonically said. When Harry didn’t answer, Snape reached over with his bare foot and tapped Harry’s.

“There’s a difference between being killed in a war and actively sacrificing myself,” Harry said, his voice low in the dark. “Just as I’m not as brave as everyone says. I don’t have a choice. That’s different.”

He shuffled himself on the bed, a little bit closer to the middle and toward Snape.

“There’s also a difference between suspecting and being told it’s true.”

The scene shifted again to a bright sunny day, of Snape sitting at the table shirtless, his face contorted in pain as Harry did his best to massage an arm muscle cramping so strongly that the knot could be seen through the skin. 

Finally, they ended up in the bothy in the evening, cheap beer at the table where Snape was sitting. Harry was in a vest, moving his right arm constantly as he fought the pins and needles from the nerve regrowth.

“You’ve thought of what you’ll do after the war?” Snape asked. He had a stress ball in his right hand, squeezing it methodically.

“I’ll go to the muggle world for a bit,” Harry said. “It’s what I’ve done every year after, gone to the Dursley’s. And something has always happened at the end of the school term. It’s like a time to reset myself, take stock of what’s happened and deal with it.”

He swung his arm around as he paced in front of the bed, grimacing at the feeling. 

“What about you? Will you leave Hogwarts?”

“If I escape Azkaban, I shall consider myself lucky,” Snape said, taking a sip of his beer. “Should I even survive.”

“You’ll survive,” Harry said, pausing to pour some more beer for himself. “What happened to that brew fame and bottle glory stuff?”

“Bottle fame, brew glory,” Snape corrected, rolling his eyes. “Thank you ever so much for paying attention.”

“That’s it,” Harry said, with a smirk. “Maybe I was thinking of Slughorn’s speech.”

Snape threw the stress ball at Harry, but his right arm wasn’t strong enough yet to aim it properly. Having had a jar of cockroaches launched at his head once before, Harry was grateful for that.

“It may come to a surprise to you but the killing curse isn’t cured by a potion.”

Harry shrugged. “It’s not supposed to be survivable at all. But you should plan for something. You won’t be tied to Dumbledore, or Hogwarts anymore.”

“That’s very naïve of you to think that,” Snape said. He got up to retrieve the stress ball, so he could continue to work on his arm. “I will always be seen as a professor, as a Death Eater.”

He moved around Harry, picking up the ball. Harry had stopped swinging his arm around, but was still trying to flex his muscles to see where he was in the regrowth stages.

“Which is rubbish,” Harry said. Snape looked at his arm, tracing his finger down the bicep to Harry’s elbow.

“Still can’t really feel that,” Harry said. “And that’s the problem with the magical world. Everything is judged, from the moment you step in as a child. Your wand judges you and proclaims the type of person you are or will become; your robes, whether they’re new or hand me downs. Your animal that you bring to school. The house you are sorted into. That’s a lot to put on an eleven-year-old.”

Snape prodded Harry’s arm further, gently squeezing Harry’s forearm, and then moving to his fingers to test their strength.

“I didn’t choose to be a Death Eater at eleven, if that is what you’re implying,” Snape murmured.

“I’m not,” Harry said, staring down at his hand as Snape worked. “But my point stands. People still talk about what house someone belongs to, long after they’ve left Hogwarts. Why can that person not have changed? Grown? What if the hat is only right for that moment in time?”

Snape moved back up Harry’s arm, tapping the skin with his finger. He got to the upper arm and started poking it.

“The sorting hat is one of the most intelligent and sentient objects in the magical world,” Snape said, moving to the inside of Harry’s arm.

“Ow,” Harry said, swatting away Snape’s hand. “Stop it, I can feel that.”

“Can you?” Snape asked, and he had a mischievous glint in his eye as he kept poking, despite Harry trying to wrestle his arm away.

“Yes,” Harry said, laughing. He tried to spin away but tripped on the chair leg that was next to him. Snape caught him, pulling Harry back against his chest.

Harry watched himself in the memory, seeing the soft and happy smile on his own face as Snape held him tight and murmured something in his ear. He felt a sudden pang in his gut, longing for that closeness again.

“Okay,” he said, and they shot up out of the memories and landed back in the office, Harry with a guarded expression as he waited to see what his friends would say. It was a lot to take in, he knew it was, and he’d been deliberately vague when previously recounting his time in the bothy. And now they knew why.

“Harry,” Hermione said, slowly shaking her head. He couldn’t tell if she felt sorry for him or disappointed for what he’d shown her. “I wish you could have told us before.”

He gave a hopeful little smile at those words, but looked on to Ron to see how Ron was doing.

“He never mentioned that summer day to you again?” Ron carefully asked, making sure his words wouldn’t be understood by the portraits.

“Never as long as I was a student. Ever,” Harry confirmed.

Ron nodded.

“There’s one more memory,” Harry said. “One more that I want to show you. But it starts a little, um. Well, you’ll see.”

“It’s okay, Harry,” Hermione said. “We’ll keep it secret.”

“Yeah,” Ron agreed. “It stays with us.”

Harry drew one more strand out and floated it down into the bowl, taking a deep breath before they entered the memory.

It was early morning, frost on the window sills of the bothy and the sun just starting to rise in the window. The dark room suddenly flashed brightly and an alarm sounded, piercing the silent morning.

In the flashing light it became evident that two people were together on the bed, sleeping in a spooning pose under the same blanket. The little spoon, Harry, immediately jumped out of bed, stark naked as he ran to the window to look outside.

“We’ve been discovered,” Snape urgently said, whipping the blanket off and grabbing a shirt to put on. He dropped his wand a few times, but finally gripped it strongly enough to cast a few spells. “Several people in the outer perimeter of the forest.”

“Outer?” Harry asked, “they’re not by the bothy, but I can see smoke to the south.”

“Muggle or magic?” Snape demanded, not bothering with socks as he shoved his boots on.

Harry squinted as he looked out again.

“Can’t tell, but…. the smoke looks like a dragon’s tail.”

Snape froze, before throwing trousers at Harry. “Fiendfyre. They know you’re here”

“How?” Harry demanded, getting dressed as quickly as he could. Once he was done, he used magic to summon everything useful in the bothy, cramming it into a backpack. He’d put a space enhancing spell on it, like Hermione’s bag, but Harry wasn’t sure he’d be able to fit everything in in time. The alarms were getting more frequent, and the flames of the fire were closely visible in the window.

“It doesn’t matter,” Snape said, also packing all his things. “They don’t know exactly where, hence the fire. And it’ll burn this whole area.”

“So, this is it,” Harry said, closing his bag and looking around for anything else he’d missed. One of the windows suddenly exploded from the fire, which had formed into wings of a dragon and smashed it. Harry fell to the floor, grunting as a shard of glass slashed him in the leg.

Snape dropped to the floor, wand immediately at the glass to pull it out.

“Leave it, I can do it,” Harry said, his own hand shaking as he tried to do it himself.

“We need to go,” Snape needlessly said. Within seconds the glass was out and Harry grimaced as the cut was healed. Snape worked fast; his own bag used as a shield over his head as the second window in the bothy exploded. “The fire will consume everything.”

He shoved the remaining bottles of nerve regrowth potion in Harry’s pockets, and went to stand up to disapparate. Harry caught him before he could, his hand reaching to the back of Snape’s head and grasping his hair.

“See you at the finish line,” Harry said, giving Snape a rough and desperate kiss. The back wall of the bothy darkened ominously and started smoking as the fire raged around. Flames broke through as they disapparated, and the memory vanished.

The landing back in the Headmistress’ office was smoother this time, and Harry spent a minute collecting his memory from the pensieve while Ron and Hermione processed what they’d just seen.

Hermione approached, picking up a _Daily Prophet_ from the desk, and instead of offering sympathies, began whacking him in the arm. “I thought you said you were fine!”

“It was war! Fine is relative!” Harry exclaimed, caught off guard and trying to shield himself from her smacks.

Ron made absolutely no effort to stop her, but drew his wand immediately when he saw a shadow move at the other end of the room.

“What a surprise, to find you three in a place you don’t belong at Hogwarts.”

McGonagall was standing in the doorway of the office in a dressing gown, her hair tied up into a bonnet and her expression slightly less than amused as she stared at them. She looked like she had been in for the evening and been disrupted by whatever alarm they’d set off.

“Happy Christmas, Professor,” Ron said, relaxing a bit once he realised they weren’t in danger.

“And to you, Mr Weasley. To what do I owe this honour?” McGonagall said. “You _could_ visit during regular daytime hours, of course.”

“Sorry,” Harry said, “but we needed a pensieve and couldn’t think of where else to get one on Christmas day.”

She tsked at them, but Harry suspected she wasn’t really that angry.

“And I suppose it couldn’t wait?”

“Not really,” Ron said, with a contrite shrug. “It’s some war stuff. And it’s been a long day.”

“We should probably go, in that case,” Hermione said, giving Ron and Harry a pointed look. “Sorry to bother you, Professor.”

McGonagall gave them a fond smile.

“You’re always welcome,” she said. “And should you decide to give me notice next time, I shall have tea ready.”

Harry grinned.

“That’d be nice. We’ll send an owl,” he said. She was stern and often had a disapproving look on her face, but Harry knew that she cared for them quite a bit.

“I will see you in a few days in any event, Mr Potter, to continue your NEWTS. I presume you received a note from Severus regarding the change?”

Harry nodded as he put the pensieve back in the cabinet.

“I really don’t know why he changed his mind all of a sudden,” she said, looking at him expectantly. “But I look forward to teaching you again.”

“Conflict of interest,” Harry offered. He pointed at the fireplace. “Could we use the floo?”

She waved her permission, and before they could get into further trouble, they said their goodbyes and spun away into the flames.

Harry landed first at the flat, noting that the television had switched over to a different muggle Christmas movie that Harry wasn’t as familiar with.

“So now you know,” Harry said, dusting the fireplace ash off his clothing with a dust pan. He still hadn’t looked up at his friends, and was trying to act casually.

“He seemed so different,” Hermione said, as she moved into Harry’s kitchen to put on a kettle.

“Yeah. It was weird,” Ron said, flopping down on the couch. “How’s your leg?”

“Scarred,” Harry shrugged. “You’ve already seen me naked tonight, so you’ll just have to imagine the scar.”

Ron laughed.

“Are you okay with this?” Harry asked, his tone more serious. 

Hermione stood in the doorway of the kitchen, waiting for the kettle to finish.

“We don’t know him like you do, Harry,” she said. “I’d be open to meeting him again, as adults, but it’s going to be a challenge to make the wizarding world like him.”

“He’s built a bit of a reputation,” Ron said, intentionally understating the truth.

“Yeah, he has,” Harry agreed. “But I know this side of him now. And I miss what we had in the bothy.”

Ron glanced up at Hermione, his expression softening as he looked at her.

“I get that, mate,” Ron said.

“Harry,” Hermione started, looking a bit hesitant about what she was going to say next. “Do you think the bothy was real? Or that maybe it was an opportunity of war, for both of you?”

“I dunno,” Harry said. “That’s why I want to see. I haven’t fallen in love with him or anything, it was literally just a few weeks.”

“I’d be a bit concerned if you had, given that he murdered Dumbledore and was such a prick at school,” Ron said. He looked like he was trying to be helpful at least, and didn’t seem surprised when Harry rolled his eyes.

“He’s still not that nice,” Harry said. “We’ve argued a few times since I’ve been back already. But, it’s more on even ground, if that makes sense.”

Hermione came back from the kitchen with her tea, looking quite pensive.

“It does,” she said. “But this isn’t going to go down well, I don’t think. People are going to have a hard enough time with you coming out, without it being Snape that you’re dating. The bad history between you two isn’t a secret, and some might think he groomed you.”

“That’s sort of why I asked about the parade memory,” Ron said, making room on the couch for Hermione. “Because if he had, I’m not above…”

“He definitely didn’t,” Harry interrupted. “He never mentioned it at all, until we were in the bothy.”

“Is he out?” Hermione asked.

“He said he was, to some,” Harry answered. “But to be honest I think a lot of the people he came out to are now dead.”

Ron snorted at that, and Harry smirked a little. It wasn’t really that funny, but it was definitely a true hazard of Snape’s life up until that point.

Hermione sighed. “You really don’t like to do things the easy way, Harry.”

“Do you know other gay wizards you could set me up with?” Harry sarcastically threw back.

“Well, no,” she admitted. “And from your memories… it doesn’t necessarily look like a bad match. But just… be careful, okay?”

“I don’t think there’s a lot of overlap in being careful, and being myself, in those Venn diagrams you like,” Harry said.

……

Harry held the purple heart block up to the window and slowly rotated it, checking to see if there were any knots in it. He’d sharpened his chisels earlier that morning and had split the

wood already, but it was hard on his tools and dulled the chisel edges faster than he’d expected. He had a notepad beside him, and had taken a few notes on the wood as he’d worked. It was stubborn and unyielding, harsh against the steel of his tools. But sanded well, which Harry thought was interesting. Almost like the inside was hardened and strong, but the outside easily finished and yielded to fit the final design. 

Perhaps a wand suited for a government representative, Harry thought. He added that to his notes for Ollivander, and continued working on it. The hardness of the wood made Harry think that phoenix feather or dragon heart string would be a better match, as he suspected the unicorn hair wouldn’t handle the immobility as well.

He worked a little bit longer on it, shaping the wood into an elongated diamond, to place on the end of a broken elm wand that he had picked up in a second-hand shop. If he was right, the woods would pair well with the dragon heartstring he was adding, and if not, well. He’d test it outside somewhere to minimise potential damage.

Satisfied with how the wood was forming, Harry put it back down on the desk and stretched. Den would be there in the next half hour or so, and Harry was keeping himself busy to distract himself from being nervous. He eyed the red oak again, the small off-cut that he’d found in Diagon Alley, that felt friendly and calming in his hand. He didn’t know what he was going to do with it yet, but couldn’t stop picking it up. It was a comforting piece of wood, and though Harry’s own wand felt back to normal again with the walnut he’d added, he knew he’d find a good use for the oak.

……

_December 26th, 1998_

“I really appreciate this, Harry,” Katie said twenty minutes later, setting up a recorder on the table in front of them. She had a muggle recorder ready to go, and a self-writing quill with a fresh pad of paper next to it. “We’ve had some sales, but I think you being on the cover will make people take our magazine seriously.”

Harry gave her an awkward smile and adjusted his watch, turning it over on his wrist. His scars weren’t fully hidden, and though Harry wanted to pull his sleeves down over his hand, he didn’t.

“Thanks,” Harry said. “This is my one and only interview, I think.”

“You make it sound like you have big secrets to tell,” Katie said. Den moved around them, setting up photo lights and adjusting the blinds in Harry’s sitting room to control the shadows.

“Yeah,” Harry said, shaking his right arm a little. He’d noticed that the nerves ached more when he was nervous. “Might do.”

“Well, let’s start with something easy,” Katie gently said. She’d always been a fierce competitor on the Gryffindor quidditch team, but Harry had admired her friendliness all through his years at Hogwarts and was pleased to see that even after the war she was the same honest and likeable friend.

“Did you have a nice holiday in the muggle world?”

Harry laughed. 

“Yeah, I think I did. I just wanted to go somewhere where the only thing I had to fight was a cash machine.”

Katie grinned. “We’ll have to explain what that is to the purebloods. Were you successful?”

“With the cash machines? Absolutely not,” Harry said, with a grin. “But again, I wasn’t the only one fighting them. Muggles have problems with them too.”

“They’re more of an inconvenience than useful sometimes,” Den agreed.

“But it was all right. For a while it was hard to believe that it was finally over, and I think it was good for me to be in a place where no one talked about it to me. Because they didn’t know it had happened.”

Katie nodded at that, and checked to see that her notes we being recorded properly.

“Now that you’re back are you going to be joining the Ministry?” Katie asked.

“No,” Harry said. He didn’t add anything else, but she was waiting and he realised that his answer wasn’t really helpful for writing an article. “No, I’m interested in making wands and I’ve been learning about it from Mr Ollivander.”

“Learning from, not competing against?”

“No competition,” Harry confirmed, shaking his head. “I don’t think I’d enjoy running a shop at all. I just…my entire life as a wizard was directed at this one big thing. Defeating Voldemort. And that’s okay, that’s what needed to be done. But it is done now, and I don’t need to be that person any more. I can step back and let other people, more qualified people, do that sort of thing.”

“Would you consider teaching defence though?” Den asked. “You were great with Dumbledore’s Army.”

“You were brilliant as students,” Harry said. “And the group was brilliant too, but there’s better people that can teach that. I’ve spent the last few years being paranoid and on high alert, and I don’t think I could do that for the rest of my life. “

“I think that’s understandable,” Katie said, flipping over her question page in her hand. “You’ve always been known as the Boy Who Lived, and I suppose people expected you to go on to lead the aurors.”

“Yes, exactly,” Harry said, a bit bluntly. “That’s the problem with the Boy Who Lived. They expect him to pick right up after the war and lead the aurors against dark wizards for decades to come. But that’s not what I’ve been doing. I’ve been jogging, and reading, and watching football. And people are disappointed to hear it. Fine. That’s what I want from now on. Mild befuddlement and disappointment. That’s me.”

“It really isn’t,” Katie laughed. “For what you’ve done for us, I don’t ever think you’ll be a disappointment.”

“I hope you’re right,” Harry said, chewing his bottom lip a little.

“Have you found it hard to let go? To not try to jump in and help people?”

“Sure, that’s part of why I left,” Harry said. “Back in May there was lots of talk about searching out Voldemort supporters, and I was a bit interested in that. But it brought back a lot of anxiety, so I stopped.”

He paused for a moment and summoned a glass of water.

“I do have a friend in the muggle world, who I’d love to help make her life easier. The urge is always there. But I know I can’t.”

Den called for a pause, and flipped the tape in the muggle recorder. Harry wiped his hands on his jeans, knowing that he’d give his secret soon and still feeling quite nervous about it. He couldn’t stop remembering Charlie’s reaction, but tried to push it out of his mind.

“This has always been a mystery, since it was first reported over a year ago,” Katie started, and Harry knew immediately what was coming. “What really happened at the Massacre of Godric’s Hollow?”

“I think the papers built this up to be a big disaster, a conspiracy, or a battle,” Harry said. “But it really wasn’t. I planned to meet someone there, and I wanted to visit the grave of my parents on Christmas. I wasn’t the only one who had that idea.”

“Was there a fight?” Den asked, his attention rapt.

“No,” Harry said, shaking his head. “I didn’t even know they’d died. I escaped, and found out the next day.” 

Katie’s gaze floated down to his hand, and Harry looked down as well.

“I’m not sure I want to talk about that,” Harry quietly said. He still wasn’t fully sure why; he had plenty of other scars that weren’t a secret, and the lightning bolt one was even famous. But the arm scarring was a reminder of how close he’d come to death during the war, that hadn’t been inevitable, and it was still a physical weakness to him.

“Sure,” Den said. “We’ll maybe still show it in the pictures, but that’s okay.”

Harry nodded, and took another sip of water.

“What about the Burning of Dartmoor?” Den asked.

“I didn’t cause it, if that’s what you mean,” Harry said, with a slightly cheeky smile. “But I was there.”

“Was it a duel?” Katie asked. “We saw almost nothing of you during that year, and only heard lies from Death Eaters, tales of you fleeing and failing and such.”

“No, it wasn’t a duel,” Harry said, his smile gone. “I wasn’t just laying low last year, I had things to do to make sure he never came back. I spent months on the run, in hiding. Only seeing or speaking to two or three other people. Trying to be ready for the final battle. And on a cold morning in January my location was found.”

Katie had such a look of concern on her face that Harry glanced away, finding it slightly uncomfortable.

“And they couldn’t take the chance that they’d miss me,” Harry said. “They were smart. Fiendfyre is terrifying and destructive and will never stop hunting and consuming everything in its path. It looks like a massive dragon made of fire. I can’t explain the fear and feeling of being absolute prey as it chases you, incinerating everything. I’ve only ever faced it twice in my life and if I never see it again it’ll still be too soon.”

Harry took a break in the silence to push away the memory that was at the forefront of his mind. He knew that it had made the news, knew that it had sparked a fierce number of rumours and speculation that Harry had been killed, or Harry had gone mad and started it. He’d read later that it had taken a team of ten wizards to restore the forest to Dartmoor.

“Maybe a lighter question, Harry?” Katie asked. “Do you have happy dating news we can share?”

“That’s… not really lighter,” Harry said. He scratched the back of his neck out of nervousness.

“I’m not currently dating anyone,” Harry said, and that part was easy. Katie and Den looked curious; he could tell they didn’t know why it’d be difficult. Harry swallowed. “And when I do, it won’t be a witch.”

“It won’…oh,” Katie said, her voice soft. Den blinked a few times, as if he wasn’t sure he’d heard correctly.

“It won’t be a troll either though, right?” Katie said, smiling in a way that he knew she understood but was offering the light-heartedness tease.

“No. No, it’ll be a wizard,” Harry confirmed. “Gay.”

Den gave him a small nod.

“Do you want us to print that though, Harry?” Den asked. “Once it’s out…”

“Then I will be too,” Harry finished. “I know. This could be a terrible idea.”

He got up out of the chair and went to the window, looking down on to the people in Diagon Alley. He itched to do something with his hands, and reached over to pick up the red oak chunk from his desk.

“But it’s going to come out at some point, and I’d rather control it. I want to do that through your magazine, instead of the _Daily Prophet_.”

Harry turned back around, tossing the wood back to his desk.

“It’s a big deal, isn’t it?” Harry said, as if he wasn’t actually certain himself. Maybe he’d just been working it up in his head for so long that he’d blown it out of proportion. But after Charlie’s reaction, maybe not. 

“But I can’t hide this. I don’t want to.”

“We’ll write it seriously, don’t worry,” Katie said. “And we’ll stand behind you.”

“Yeah, Harry,” Den said. “We’re okay with it. You’re the one who beat You Know Who. No one should say anything bad to you.”

“Hopefully not,” Harry said, with a false smile. He didn’t believe it would be that easy. It wasn’t even just the differentness of it; the wizarding world was small, and he knew feathers would be ruffled that he wouldn’t be settling down and having children right away, as was generally expected. He knew there were more Charlies to come.

“Do you have a message you want to say to anyone about it?” Den asked.

Harry shrugged.

“Other than it’s not really their business?”

“Hah, yeah,” Den said. “Hopefully people take it that way.”

“Even if they don’t, I’ve definitely faced worse,” Harry said.

“That’s…true,” Den agreed. “Why don’t we get a picture for the front page?”

“Good idea,” Katie said. “I think I can work with what we’ve got. I’ll owl you the draft this week, before we start printing.”

They spent a few minutes arranging the flat before deciding on the best position. Den tried a few different angles with the lighting, and finally it was Harry sitting on his couch in jeans, his dark grey knit jumper, and hair wildly sticking up in random directions. He was leaning forward, elbows on his knees, holding the red oak block loosely in his hands. The scarring was slightly noticeable, but not the focus of the shot – that instead was Harry’s fierce gaze and strong green eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can find some helpful information on Section 28 if you google that term - both the BBC and Pinknews have good articles on it. It was a terrible act that was passed to legalise violence, hatred, and bigotry toward LGBT youth and adults, from 1988 up until it was repealed in 2000 and 2003. It took away a lot of support for queer youth at a very hard time in their lives. Fuck Margaret Thatcher.


	9. Chapter 9

_December 28 th, 1998_

Harry flicked his right wrist up and down a few times, frustrated that it was bothering him again. The potion Snape had given him before Christmas had worked fairly well, but Harry knew nothing would be permanent and the nerves would bother him for the rest of his life. He debated whether he’d tell McGonagall, or try to use his left hand.

He’d had a quiet few days post-Christmas, working on a wand order from home and sending his notes off to Ollivander. The Weasleys, minus Charlie, had visited, and brought a letter from Charlie. Harry had almost burnt the letter before he decided to read it, but found that it appeared to be somewhat genuine in apology.

He walked between the rows of desks in the room, left hand fingers tracing marks carved into the wood of the flip top desks, remembering the lessons he’d taken there. As an eleven-year-old brand new to magic, it had been stunning to watch McGonagall at the podium returning back to human form after monitoring them as a cat. He’d never really had much interest in becoming an animagus himself, but just the fact that it could be achieved fascinated him.

There was so much magic he didn’t know about. The wand lore he’d been studying was so nuanced and detailed that he knew he could spend years on it and not learn everything. There were even conferences where wand makers could meet and discuss newly found woods and core combinations. And that was just wand making – Harry knew there were hundreds of careers and specialties through other branches of magic too. The feeling of regret had settled back into his head again, regret and loss. He’d been marked to be the hero since he was a toddler, and he was more keenly aware than ever how many normal wizarding experiences that he’d never get because of it. 

Maybe the half-heartedly proposed return year to Hogwarts was not such a rubbish idea after all. They’d been so eager to move on, to move out and live without the heavy thoughts of war constantly in the background, but Harry felt a draw to go back, to experience nights in the dorm laughing and chattering with the lads, rowdy dinners in the Great Hall, and days of learning new ways to do magic.

“Something wrong, Mr Potter?” McGonagall asked, swiftly walking into the room and startling him out of his thoughts.

“No,” Harry said, giving her a smile. She looked good for her age and Harry was happy to see that unlike himself, she didn’t seem to have any obvious scars from the war. “Just thinking a bit.”

Her expression softened as she took her seat at the front podium desk.

“Have you sorted whatever it was troubling you three on Christmas?”

“Oh, yeah,” Harry said. He was leaning against one of the student desks at the front of the room, but didn’t know if he should be sitting down properly or if it was fine to stand as is.

“We got separated last year, around Christmas. It was time for them to see some of what happened.”

She’d pulled out some notes from her desk drawer, and paused as she looked up at him.

“You’ve been rather careful not to leave many pieces to put together about last Christmas,” she said, and it wasn’t an admonishment either. Harry had always respected her as a professor, especially as a much younger student, but she’d begun talking to him more and more like the adult he’d become over the last few years, working in the Order. He was inordinately pleased to see that that progression had not changed.

“You know I was with Severus at the time,” Harry said, his voice calm with a neutral tone. There’d been a boisterous meeting and argument after the final battle, when the members of the Order of the Phoenix had gathered in secret in the early hours after the war to take stock of what had happened and what information they were going to let out. Snape’s defence had been planned at the same meeting, and it had been the combined force of the Order that had guaranteed Snape’s acquittal and path to acceptance with the public as a true agent of Dumbledore.

“I couldn’t say anything then, because Snape was supposed to still be working for Voldemort.”

“I’ve little doubt you were both working on something very important and secretive,” she said.

Harry could feel his face flushing red, and hoped she either wouldn’t notice or at least wouldn’t comment on it.

“We were,” he confirmed, quieter than he’d been speaking earlier. “There’s a few reasons I don’t want to talk much about it. People don’t know a lot of what I did last year, and that’s fine. But they know the barest things about December and January, and they’re curious about them. But they only know about them because they’re two things that went wrong.”

He felt slightly uncomfortable with the soft look that she gave him, her hands clutched together at her desk.

“It’s not for teaching that I would like to know,” she gently said. “But rather to provide support in dealing with whatever happened. I can see the same scars on both of you.”

“Oh,” Harry said, looking down at his hand. It was colder in Scotland than it was in London, and his nerves were predictably going haywire and pulsing sporadically with pain.

“Did Severus tell you anything?” Harry asked. “I’ve just done an interview with Denis and Katie for their magazine, and gave a few more details there.”

“No,” she said, a small pursed smile on her face. “I look forward to the interview though. He also does not share details, but commented that you have a talent for strategy adaptations and are a magnet for chaos. The fact that you refer to him as Severus, though, is certainly telling.”

Harry coughed.

“What am I making today?”

McGonagall looked very much like a cat that had cornered its prey, but she graciously dropped the topic.

“A silver biscuit tray, Mr Potter. Out of that tarnished broach there,” she said, taking his obvious subject change with great amusement. “I normally have students make the tray out of wood, but I hear that you’re very good at working with that in other capacities now.”

“It’s a fun hobby,” Harry said, studying the broach and seeing if there were any pins or bits that stuck out on the underside that would affect the transformation. “I started out because my wand wasn’t working quite right after the war.”

He waved his wand as steadily as he could, watching the silver of the broach melt down on the desk and thin out into a rectangle, with a tidy pattern of lines around the edges.

The tray wobbled a bit as it settled into shape, and Harry scowled at his hand. Once the silver had set though, it was straight and even, with symmetry in the design.

“Well done, Potter,” McGonagall said, and Harry knew she’d noticed the hand wobble. “Does that happen often?

“It’s fine,” Harry said. “Another reason I won’t be an auror.”

He hated the look she gave him, the small flash of pity. She’d championed so much for him to be an auror when Umbridge threw up every possible roadblock, and Harry felt grateful for it. But wand making had given him some purpose again, had sparked the thirst he had to know more and spend hours working on getting the right shapes and combinations of woods and cores.

“I must say, I didn’t picture you as one to sit down and work on wands,” she said, and there was no malice in her voice. “You were never particularly good at sitting still and staying out of trouble.”

“Don’t worry. I’m working with knives and some wand combinations can be destructive in testing,” Harry said, with a grin. He held his left hand out, where she could see all the little still-healing knicks on his fingers from his carving knife hitting them. “It’s just, I’m my own danger now. That’s all.”

She handed him his transfiguration certificate, giving him a stern look.

“It was not a challenge, Potter,” McGonagall said.

……

_December 31 st, 1998_

Harry circled around his flat, trying to take a long look about and make sure that he hadn’t left anything out that was overly wizardly. His loo was plain but clean, the kitchen had been tidied and the box of Owl O’s on his table had been put away. The sitting room was tidy; his broomstick stored in the bedroom, newspapers shoved into a trunk, and his books on wand lore and potions hidden in his credenza. Harry hadn’t put any pictures or posters on the wall yet so he didn’t have to worry about those at least.

A banging sound on Harry’s door distracted him, and he went to answer.

“You can use magic to carry these, can’t you?” Harry asked, finding Ron at the door balancing a paper bag of snacks and two six-packs of Runespoor Red beer in his hands.

“Didn’t know if Alice was here already, did I?” Ron grumbled, shoving some of the beer at Harry’s chest.

“Nah, not yet,” Harry said. “I have to go get her anyway, the door is really hard to find from the muggle side.”

“Makes sense,” Ron said, dropping his stuff on the beat-up wood kitchen table. “The labels on these aren’t exactly magical.”

Harry pulled a bottle out of the box he put down next to Ron’s and checked it out. The snake would likely get a comment, but nothing mentioned wizards or magic specifically.

“I think it’s fine. Anything else I forgot?”

“I dunno, this is my world,” Ron said, clapping Harry on the back. “Ask Hermione.”

“Idiotic…” Kreacher popped into the room, expertly carrying three plastic bags of takeaway, a sour look on his face as he muttered.

“Yeah, he’s definitely not muggle friendly,” Ron said, opening a beer and pointing at Kreacher.

“No kidding,” Harry said, helping Kreacher open the bags. They’d ordered in some Indian food, and Harry planned to give Kreacher the rest of the night off.

“Harry!” Hermione called, from the door. “Brought some muggle snacks; is Alice here yet?”

“No, not yet,” Harry replied, walking out of the kitchen. “Can you do one last look round for magic things?”

“It’s fine,” Ron said, leaning against the kitchen doorframe. “If she notices something and we can’t explain it, we can just modify her memory.”

“No, we certainly cannot, Ron,” Hermione said, her expression firm. She’d put the snacks down on the credenza top and was trying to glance around the room to help Harry. “It’s against the law.”

“Oh, you’re one to talk,” Ron said.

“You know I was questioned over my parents’ case,” Hermione tersely reminded him. “I know it was war and Kingsley helped out, but I was almost fined for doing magic on muggles.”

“All right, all right,” Ron said, shrugging. “We’ll just give her firewhiskey then.”

Hermione rolled her eyes at that, and pointed to the top of the tv.

“Fred’s portrait.”

“Right,” Harry said, walking over to it with his wand out. “I can just put a stasis spell on it, I think.”

“Did they give you the frame?” Ron asked, clearly suspicious. He laughed when Harry nodded. “No, you can’t. They made sure you couldn’t silence them.”

“What kind of pillock blocks a portrait stasis spell,” Harry muttered, picking up the frame.

“You rang?” Fred asked, sliding into the frame.

“You’re going in the bottom of my trunk,” Harry firmly told him.

“Kinky,” Fred replied, giving him a wink.

……

“Blimey your flat is hard to find,” Alice said, following Harry up the stairs. “Also, these stairs aren’t level.”

“Aren’t they?” Harry asked, taking a closer look. Nothing in the wizarding world was dead straight, and he found it comforting. Magic removed a lot of concern about rickety and wonky buildings.

“No, you really need your glasses checked,” she muttered. Harry popped open the door and was grateful to see that Kreacher had left.

“Wow,” Alice said, stepping in. She handed her coat to Harry, who tossed it toward the coat rack he had at the door. One of the hooks stretched to catch it, as usual, and Harry’s face tensed, but Alice was busy looking around and didn’t notice.

The sitting room was a fairly large space, though the eaves were sloped by the windows, it being the top floor flat. He’d stuck a sofa in the middle of the room, with a tv on one wall and a short credenza behind the sofa. His desk was under the window, cleaned up except for the purple heart end he’d been carving a few days earlier.

“Hey Alice,” Ron said, sitting at the sofa. He’d lit a fire in the fireplace, but done it the muggle way as the flames were the regular orange-y red colour instead of a vivid green.

“Hello, hello,” Alice said, kicking off her boots. She had a Tesco carrier bag in one hand and after taking out a bottle of wine, plopped it on Harry’s credenza. She looked around with unhidden curiosity, hand on her hip.

“Hi Hermione. I have to say, I’m a bit disappointed. It’s very boring here.”

“Excuse me,” Harry said, giving her an offended look. “I just moved in….”

“No, no,” she waved her hand. “It’s fine, I was just expecting bats or weird ritualistic things or ghosts in the rafters or something.”

She sat down on the couch next to Hermione, still looking around the flat. Ron gave a fake laugh at her comment.

“Yeah, hah, who has ghouls in the rafters?” he asked. Hermione kicked him to shut him up.

“Alice is trying to figure out who I am,” Harry explained to Ron and Hermione, rolling his eyes. “She doesn’t think I’m human.”

“I think you’re human,” Alice said, correcting him. “Just a fuckin’ weird one. Have you seen Neverwhere? If you’re from London Below I would not be surprised.”

“Mm, I can see that,” Hermione said.

“Yeah, that makes sense. London Below. This is a _fourth_ floor flat, Alice” Harry said. 

“Well, I don’t know how it works,” Alice said, grinning. “It was so hard to find I was beginning to think it was on purpose.”

“I think this is a weird leftover factory building,” Hermione offered. “That’s why it’s not marked properly.”

“Sure,” Alice said. “but those aren’t the only odd things. Turn out your pockets,” she said raising her eyebrow at Harry and waiting.

“Fuck off, Alice,” Harry said in a mirthful tone. He went to the kitchen and started bringing out the dinner containers. Hermione jumped up to help, and they soon had a heaving coffee table with a variety of Indian food, with New Year’s festivities on mute on the telly. The conversation flowed between what happened at Christmas and plans for the future, with Alice trying to suss out if Harry had ever resolved things with Snape.

“I’m working on it,” Harry told her, sitting back in the chair and putting his plate back down. “I don’t work as fast as you do.”

“You move like a glacier, you do. Anyone else you’re interested in?”

“ _Is_ there anyone else?” Ron said. “I don’t know of anyone else in our… community.”

Alice squinted at that, but didn’t call him out.

“You probably just don’t notice them,” Alice confidently told Ron. “Unless you know what you’re looking for.”

“Like gaydar,” Hermione said.

“Exactly,” Alice confirmed. “Which, I like to think mine is pretty good, but if I saw Harry on the streets I wouldn’t really peg him as gay. But I met him at a gay bookstore, so here we are.”

“I can’t tell if this is an insult or not,” Harry said, still relaxed in his chair. Hermione looked amused.

“Listen harder. So, here’s the thing, gays are usually pretty clothing-conscious,” Alice explained. “They make sure they match their outfits well, that they look good, take care of their looks.”

Ron looked like he was fighting a laugh, and Harry knew exactly who he was thinking of as a prime example that went against everything Alice just said.

“But Harry here, doesn’t follow that,” she continued. “Sure, he’s got clean clothes, and dresses simply but nicely. But that hair.”

“His hair’s always been like that,” Hermione noted, agreeing with Alice. Harry gave them both the fingers.

“All right, enough of the roast, you arses; it’s a games night.”

“She’s sort of right, mate, you’ve been wearing the same kind of thing since you were 12,” Ron said, agreeing.

“He is an otter though,” Alice continued. “Which is why I’m surprised Luke went for him. Luke’s always been more into the effeminate type.”

“An otter?” Hermione asked. She had a puzzled look on her face and Harry could tell she was frustrated that she didn’t know what it meant.

“It’s a gay stereotype,” Alice explained. “Lean, muscles, but not a body builder. With a hairy chest. He’s too small to be a bear, too hairy to be a twink.”

“Otters and bears,” Ron said, nodding. “What other labels are there? What would I be?”

“Straight, Ron. You’d be dead straight,” Harry said. “Can we please play the game and leave me alone?”

Alice grinned at him but acquiesced. “All right. Everyone here know how to play Cluedo?”

It had taken a few rounds to get Ron used to the game, but once he got the hang of it Ron was fairly good at using his cards to work out who held what clue. Harry was just glad that the cards had drawings on them, so Ron could figure out what they were without asking in front of Alice.

“Okay, I suspect the Professor, in the conservatory, with the revolver,” Ron finally said.

“Too soon,” Harry muttered, taking a drink of beer.

Harry was picking through his cards to disprove Ron’s accusation when he felt a little pull toward the door. It wasn’t noticeable to anyone else in the room, but Harry knew someone had passed his wards at the top of the stairs and was about to knock. It was firm and decisive against the door, and Harry suspected it was Snape.

“Come in!” Harry said, putting his cards down so he could stand.

He was right about the knocker, and couldn’t help looking Snape up and down when the door was opened. It seemed that Snape was slowly shifting his clothing to be a bit more current with the times, as he wore an almost muggle-like long black wool overcoat with a black knit jumper underneath and a grey scarf. The greyscale continued down with Snape’s dark grey trousers, and the only bit of colour were his boots, which were not black as they first appeared but in fact a rich brown.

He looked good, and Harry felt the results of the once over going straight to his groin.

“Fuck me, it’s a vampire,” Alice said, under her breath but still loud enough that Harry knew Snape would have heard her.

“Hi, Severus,” Harry said.

“I did not realise you had guests,” Snape said, staring only at Harry.

“It’s New Year’s Eve games night,” Harry said, swallowing the roughness in his voice. He couldn’t figure out why Snape had come to visit, but was grasping at ideas for how to get him to stay.

“Happy New Year’s,” Hermione said, trying to appear casual as she played the next round of accusations of the game.

“Yes, and to you,” Snape said. He was carrying his satchel, and nodded at Alice and Ron.

“Is there somewhere we could speak in private?” Snape asked, giving Harry a pointed look.

“Er, yeah,” Harry said, leading Snape past the couch and credenza, toward the bedroom door next to the kitchen. He opened the door and gestured for Snape to go through, and as he closed the door, heard Hermione tell Alice that Snape was not, in fact, a vampire.

Harry had often thought about inviting Snape to his bedroom, but never with his friends in the sitting room on the other side of the wall. He was glad he’d made his bed earlier, and tidied up. As it was, he closed the door and leaned against it, watching as Severus glanced around. At the last second, Harry shot a privacy spell over his trunk, where Fred’s portrait was.

“Muffliato,” Harry added, waving his wand over the two of them.

“My own spell?” Snape asked, eyebrows raised as a challenge.

“It works well,” Harry retorted, with a shrug. “I suppose you didn’t come here to wish me a happy new year?”

“No,” Snape said, pulling a glossy magazine out of his bag. It was the new issue for the next day, Harry on the front cover staring at the camera. “It would seem that your fame is still enough for the entire front cover.”

“Go big or go home,” Harry said, his stomach flipping. “How did you get that already?”

“Printed at Hogwarts,” Snape said, not breaking eye contact. “And is being published much faster than I expected.”

“Than you expected? You can’t accuse me of hiding without expecting me to act on it,” Harry said. “I did the private thing and it already didn’t go that well. So, I’m ripping off the whole plaster now.”

“It’s a quarterly magazine, Potter. As in, another issue will come out in late spring. You’ve only been back for a fortnight!”

“So?” Harry said. “What exactly are you worried about? Do you think I’ll get some howlers and decide it’s not worth it and fuck back off to the muggle world?”

“It’s a possibility,” Snape darkly said.

“No, it really isn’t,” Harry snapped. They were standing very close and Harry felt riled up, and also a little turned on. He needed to remain focused though, so tried to ignore that his dick was getting excited by the conversation.

“The muggle world isn’t mine. I don’t have family, a job, or a life there. And I’d have to live in secret for what I was for the rest of my life. It’s hard enough to do that with Alice, and I don’t see her that often.”

He pulled the magazine out of Snape’s hand and stared at the cover, him sitting in his darkened sitting room, wood block in his hand, scars, thick jumper and wild hair. It was a good shot, definitely not the happiest one, but one that Harry felt was fully him. Finally, he looked back up at Snape.

“So, what secret do I pick to battle with? A wizard amongst the muggles, or a gay amongst the wizards?”

Snape snatched the magazine back and put it back into his bag, as if he wanted to keep it safe from damage.

“Don’t be so fucking dramatic. Your choice only affects the rest of us because it puts us to the forefront of the public’s attention.”

“Cut that ‘the rest of us’ rubbish out,” Harry said, rolling his eyes. “You’re famous too– “

“ _Infamous_.”

“–and it’s not only me that can stand for gay rights,” Harry finished, crossing his arms.

He’d missed arguing. Snape looked intense and annoyed, and Harry wanted to jump him.

“Yes, because as a Death Eater, I am a prime proponent for gay rights,” Snape sardonically said.

“Former, I would hope,” Harry said. “Which never actually stopped you from doing things in the past. So, did you just come to criticise me for the article?” Harry asked, narrowing his eyes. “Or to wish me luck, or what?”

Snape straightened up and looked put out by the accusation. Up close, Harry saw that he’d done something to his hair to make it look better than it ever did at Hogwarts, and must have had it trimmed recently because it was just touching the top of his wool coat.

He hadn’t immediately answered, and Harry looked at him with suspicion.

“That really is it. You’re upset because I can’t pull this back now, and whatever happens tomorrow is going to be what we have to live with.”

“I do not get upset, Potter,” Snape clarified.

“You absolutely do, Snape,” Harry said. “And I’m right, aren’t I?”

“Very bold and arrogant of you to assume you are,” Snape said, leaning in and poking Harry in the chest with his index finger. “Typical Gryffindor to approach this without detailed forethought to the consequences.”

“I thought we weren’t measuring someone by the house chosen for them at eleven,” Harry said, grasping Snape’s finger with his hand. He squeezed it once and let go.

“Look, you were right. Whether it’s you or someone else, I don’t want to have to live in secrecy. This was the fastest way of clearing the air, and I was able to control how it was reported. I can’t control their reactions.”

“And are you ready for the fall out?” Snape asked. It wasn’t an accusation to a student ill-prepared, like Snape had done often in Harry’s time at Hogwarts. It was a calm question, from the stand point of someone who’d faced such a fall out before.

“Is anyone ever? I’m not going to be outing anyone else, if that’s what you’re worried about.” Harry asked. “You never told me what happened when you came out.”

Snape’s eyebrows rose briefly in acknowledgement as he loosened his scarf. Harry didn’t know if the heat of the flat was getting to him, or the discussion.

“I was kicked out of my home,” Snape finally said. “Isolated amongst peers. Regarded as a person with a private life that would never be mentioned or acknowledged.”

Harry had seen the loneliness in Snape’s memories that weren’t gay related, and felt sympathetic to the abandonment.

“Wouldn’t it be great if we could change that? If we could make people realise it’s not a big deal?”

“Optimist,” Snape grumbled, but he looked calmer now and Harry was happy about that.

“Pessimist,” Harry said. He took a step closer to Snape and looked up with a mixture of defiance and hope. “For good luck?”

Harry reached up to him, his hand slipping under Snape’s hair around the side of his neck. The kiss was soft, much more so than their last frantic kiss in the bothy. Harry pushed himself against Snape, his chest pressing against the chill that was dying off of Snape’s coat. Snape had his eyes closed, lost in the kiss, and Harry smiled against his lips when Snape opened them again.

“Your eyes are great,” Harry said. He’d gotten hard, which he knew Snape could feel, but wasn’t bothered by it.

“My eyes are mud brown,” Snape replied, amusement on his tone.

“Shut it,” Harry said, smiling wider. “They’re the colour of caramel, and coffee, and trees, and cookies.”

“Potter,” Snape said, rolling said eyes.

“ _Harry_.”

“Yes,” Snape agreed, stepping back and adjusting his coat to better cover his front.

“You’ve decided then?” Harry asked, nodding at the magazine barely visible from Snape’s bag. “We can try dating?”

“Possibly, in the near future,” Snape said. He seemed to be pulling himself back together from the distraction of the kiss. “I believe you will face criticism, which will only be compounded should the public find out of my interest, most certainly worsening if they realise that the interest is not new.”

“The only three people who know vaguely of what happened in the bothy are in the room next door,” Harry said, nodding at the bedroom door. “I had never planned on sharing that particular part.”

“Well, isn’t that a surprise,” Snape dryly said. “I have yet to receive any death threats from Mr Weasley.”

“Maybe because he wants to see his best friend happy?” Harry shot back. “We’re not twelve anymore and things haven’t been black and white in a long time.”

“No, they certainly have not,” Snape sighed. “And what have you told your muggle friend?”

“She knows I’m interested in you,” Harry said, shrugging. “But she doesn’t know I’m a wizard; she certainly won’t be interviewed by the _Prophet_.”

“To be so fortunate,” Snape muttered. He flexed his hand at his side, and Harry saw that it was trembling a little. It was the same sort of tremble his own hand had, when the nerves were acting up and randomly pulsing.

Harry broke the spell on the room and opened the door, leading Snape to the front of his flat. Ron, Hermione, and Alice did a fairly passable job of pretending they hadn’t been trying to listen in, and Harry refused to answer any of their questions as they got back into the game.

….

_December 31 st, 1997_

“What’s your resolution for the new year?” Harry asked, finishing the washing up at the sink.

“To not die,” Snape mildly said. He was sitting in bed, leaning against the headboard with leftover dinner wine in a glass next to him. “Perhaps a new coat.”

“Definitely go for the coat,” Harry said, wiping his hands dry. Between them they’d had most of the bottle of wine, and Harry was feeling courageous.

“I suppose yours is more altruistic.” Snape said, flicking the page of his book over and not hiding the doubt in his voice.

“I want to have sex,” Harry said. This got Snape’s full attention, and the book was lowered a bit. 

“With anyone in particular?”

Harry approached the bed slowly, watching Snape carefully for any negative reaction.

“It’s a short list,” Harry answered.

“It’s not yet the new year,” Snape said, spreading his legs ever so slightly on the bed. Harry took that as a good sign.

“Concessions can be made in war,” Harry replied.

“What are you asking me, Potter?”

“Don’t put me back to Potter,” Harry said, pulling shirt off above his head. He stood at the edge of the bed, his jeans getting tight as he gazed up Snape’s long legs toward his midsection. Harry knew his arm still wasn’t the strongest yet, but he was able to climb up on the platform, crawling up Snape’s side of the mattress and straddling his hips.

“This is very inappropriate,” Snape murmured, dropping the book he was holding off the edge of the mattress.

“According to whom?” Harry asked, flexing his thighs around Snape. He drew his hand down the side of Snape’s face and tipped his head up so they were making eye contact. “Two consenting adults.”

And he was. Harry knew his body looked good, that he had enough muscle on him to not look scrawny. He’d filled out over the year, and had hair smattered across his chest, with a healthy trail from his navel down to his dick. His voice was deep, hands were roughened and he had a day’s worth of stubble on his face and neck.

Harry’s finger traced over Snape’s lips and then let loose a gasp of surprise when Snape surged up, hands strongly against the muscles of Harry’s back. He was pulled toward Snape, who had buried his face into the hair on Harry’s chest. His hands grasped for purchase against Snape’s shoulders, keeping himself upright.

“You make a compelling argument,” Snape said into Harry’s stomach, as his left hand snuck around front and fiddled with the button on Harry’s jeans.

“I _do_ like to argue,” Harry said, thrusting his hips up into Snape’s hand, which had snuck its way into Harry’s pants. He was bent over at an awkward position, trying to get both closer to Snape and keep Snape’s hand on his cock at the same time. It wasn’t long before he started to teeter, unable to catch himself with his right arm.

“Perhaps this is not the best position,” Snape said, tangled up in Harry’s legs.

“Have something better?” Harry asked, panting slightly.

“Clear the table,” Snape said, shifting to the end of the bed and taking a quick trip to the washroom. He came back out in tented underpants a moment later, looking slightly suspicious that Harry had changed his mind. Harry, on the other hand, was fully naked and had haphazardly shoved everything from the table to the worktop. A lone bottle of lube sat on the table.

Making his decision, Snape kicked off his pants and strode over to Harry. He was firm and dominant, his hips rubbing against Harry’s abdomen as he held Harry’s face and kissed him strongly. It was animalistic, rough kisses of two men that had either been without or never had, and were expelling months of anxiety and pent up energy into a few moments of intimate trust.

Finally, Harry pushed Snape back toward the table, but instead of sitting on it, Snape turned his back to Harry. He bent himself over, Harry planting his feet on either side of Snape’s and grabbing the lube bottle.

“Tell me when,” Harry needlessly said, his fingers dripping with lube as they traced down Snape’s furrow and found his hole. It slipped inside with a bit of resistance, and Harry started massaging and moving his fingers around in a slightly uncoordinated manner.

“Stop fucking around,” Snape growled, a moment later. Harry laughed, squeezing Snape’s arse in response. He put more lube on himself and took his cock in hand, breathing steady as he pushed in.

Demanding as always, Snape told him to hold still as he adjusted, and Harry fought every instinct to move. Finally Snape started moving himself, tentatively back and forth as he adjusted to Harry, and Harry barely could keep his focus.

“Go, Harry,” Snape snapped, holding himself up on the table with his elbows.

Snape’s back was long and slim, narrowing to his waist and Harry could just barely reach his shoulder. He held on, fingers digging into Snape’s skin as he pulled Snape back to him with every thrust. Snape was quiet, his moans swallowed by gasps and air as he worked with Harry, his bum eagerly pushing back to slam against Harry’s pelvis. 

Looking down, Harry could just see his own cock, in and out, squeezing between Snape’s surprisingly muscled arse. He tried to imagine the look from below, Snape bent over at the table and legs spread by Harry’s, heavy cock swinging with each slap of contact, Harry’s dick at the crux, slick with lube and sliding in and out, in and out.

“Fuck,” Harry groaned, his left hand moving to Snape’s hip to join his right. He sped up, the grip inconsistent as he pulled Snape back to him, as fast as he could manage. The table made a banging noise against the back cabin wall but Harry didn’t care, he just felt a primal urge to fill Snape, to get as close as physically possible. 

Snape let loose a low groan and Harry felt his balls tighten, his cock surge upward as he buried himself deep and came. 

Snape shifted and Harry held tight to keep him there, but realised that Snape was moving his left arm around to stroke himself. Now that the table wasn’t moving as violently Snape’s right arm was enough to support him, and he firmly told Harry to stay put as he quickly masturbated. Harry clumsily reached down, finding Snape’s hand with his own and joining the wank. Snape didn’t last long, the burning hot skin in Harry’s hand surging as he came.

Later, after Snape had demanded the washroom for clean-up first, and Harry had done a naked little celebration pose whilst Snape was in the bathroom, Snape returned to reading his book and Harry flopped on the bed beside him.

“Good start to the new year, Severus,” Harry said, splaying out on his side of the bed in just boxers.

He had his eyes closed and started laughing when Snape reached over and shoved Harry’s head further down into the pillow.

….

_January 1, 1999_

Harry, not quite hungover but not feeling at his greatest, peeked out of the bedroom just after 10 to survey the disaster of his living room. He’d told everyone to leave it for the next day, knowing that without Alice there he could use magic to make the task faster. It didn’t hold his attention for long though, as Harry soon noticed several owls at his window, some with letters in their claws, and at least three with bright red howlers.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wasn't fully satisfied with this at first, hence the wait. Thanks for your patience.

_January 1, 1999_

****

**_“Go back to the muggle world, you bent bastard!”_ **

The howler exploded into flames, spitting hot ash at Harry’s fingers as he glumly sat on the couch. It was anonymous, as the other two had been, but this was the more vitriolic. He’d expected the comments about being a disappointing role model, and the one about keeping his business to himself so no one had to think about such deviancy.

Harry eyed the stack of letters next to the howler ash carefully, wondering if there was anything positive in them. Part of him wanted to burn the whole lot, but he knew he wouldn’t. He couldn’t resist reading them, he wanted to know what they all said, despite the potential for more anger and disappointment.

_“Dear Mr Potter,_

_I’m not particularly certain why you’ve chosen to share that information. The magical world’s population is small, and we are in need of more witches and wizards. Your decision will leave the next generation bereft of witches and or wizards with your strong character and powerful magic. This is very selfish._

_Regards,_

_A puzzled and concerned neighbour.”_

Harry hesitated before putting that to the side. It wasn’t a great letter, but he hadn’t decided if he was going to destroy it yet.

_“Harry–_

_Hard thing to read about, mate. My brother didn’t have much luck; he’s gone muggle. Maybe he’ll feel safe coming back soon. Good luck.”_

Harry flipped the letter over and upside down, trying to see any familiar mark. The note read like it was someone he knew, but he didn’t recognise the writing and wondered if it was someone from a different house, but the same year. He placed that letter on the sofa, as if it was a bit more acceptable than the rest he’d read so far.

The next one had a wax crest seal that was a letter Q with a wand through it. Harry lifted the seal, careful not to crack it, curious about what it stood for. The writing was neat and had lots of flourish to it, and Harry immediately sensed that the author was older.

_“Mr Harry Potter,_

_Whilst we appreciate that our sort has a tendency toward drama, we would appreciate if you cease from making such a public commotion in the news. The unwanted attention and ruffling of feathers is bothersome when we have such a longstanding peaceful truce of remaining secreted in this society. You would do well to learn that._

_Sincerely,_

_Q.”_

Harry scowled and threw the letter down atop the pile of ash. He stood up and stomped toward his desk, pocketing the purple heart wand he’d been working on. It was New Year’s Day, but Harry thought he might get lucky and find Ollivander’s shop open.

….

The door to his building was a non-descript wooden door with a diamond shaped looking hole in it. It was on a wall slanted away from Potage’s Cauldron shop, barely noticed by anyone entering the Alley through the Leaky Cauldron. Harry slipped out, hands in his pockets as he kept his shoulders hunched up, eyes down at the worn cobblestones below his feet.

The Alley was unnaturally quiet, and Harry could hear soft music coming from an open window somewhere above. The snow had started again, but it was a bitter morning with harsh little pellets of snow that stung his cheeks as it landed. 

He walked with a knitted winter hat on, and a thick grey scarf wrapped around his neck. Between that and his black cloak and dark jeans, Harry didn’t look any different than other halfbloods or muggleborns making their way through Diagon Alley, and mercifully didn’t receive any looks or comments.

“I was wondering if I’d be seeing you today, Mr Potter,” Ollivander said, opening the door for him. The shop wasn’t open, but Ollivander appeared to be working on a wand at his desk.

“Black walnut you added, wasn’t it?” He asked, leading Harry to the desk in the middle of the shop. “A wood that is very attuned to inner conflict. If you were to perform any self-deception, it would lose its power.”

“I’ve known what I was for a long while,” Harry said, sitting in the now familiar stool that Ollivander had left transfigured from Harry’s last visit. “The wood I chose to fix my wand was not a mistake.”

Ollivander nodded, and returned to his own stool, sitting opposite of Harry. He didn’t say anything else, and Harry narrowed his eyes in suspicion as he unwrapped his scarf.

“Do you have a problem with what I am?”

Ollivander placed the wand he was working on to the side of the work mat, and studied Harry.

“And there is the impetuosity of the holly,” Ollivander said, waving his hand toward Harry. Harry didn’t realise how tense he’d become, sitting at the edge of the stool and waiting to see how he’d be judged.

“I do not have a problem, as you so put it. I wonder how this will affect a working partnership, as I suspect that you have received some not so pleasant correspondence by now.”

“How’d you know?”

Ollivander pointed toward the door, where two owls sat on the landing poles he had outside the door, envelopes in their beaks as they stared at Harry.

“Blimey,” Harry muttered. He walked to the door and fetched the letters, putting them in his pocket without reading them. Ollivander made a pot of tea, and used magic to bring it to the table.

“It will stop,” Ollivander said. “I’m certain there will be another quidditch event or some sort of international soiree that catches their attention.”

“I hope so,” Harry said. He sat back down on the stool, determined to change the topic away from himself. “What did you think of the purple heart notes?”

“Very interesting,” Ollivander said, summoning Harry’s notes from underneath a pile of sawdust. “Your observations regarding the characteristics of the wood were correct – the only purple heart wand I have sold has gone to a witch who later became a diplomat.”

“Really?” Harry asked. “You’ve only ever sold one?”

“Purple heart is a tree that grows in mostly South and Central American climates,” Ollivander said. “It’s a popular wood with witches and wizards in those continents, but not so much in Great Britain.”

His tone definitely conveyed his opinion that Harry should have known that.

“It blends well with the elm,” Harry said instead, pulling the wand he’d made out of his pocket. 

Ollivander took it carefully, studying the joint Harry had made to connect the two. He’d made tiny finger joints with his chisel and his own wand to connect the two pieces and was pretty chuffed with how well they’d turned out.

“The intricacies of the design is befitting of the personality that would suit this wand,” Ollivander murmured, turning it over and holding it up very closely to his face for a better look. “And what of the core?”

“Dragon heartstring,” Harry answered. “It was in the elm already so I knew it would pair well. I removed the old and replaced it with a new, longer piece.”

“Yes, I had wondered about the sizing difference,” Ollivander said, swishing the wand up and down, perfectly controlling his glass of water as it hovered over the desk.

“You can’t combine two pieces of heartstring to make it longer,” Harry said. “The dragons battle, and it’s very volatile. You can weave together unicorn hair though.”

“If you have a sufficient supply of varying lengths, that should not be necessary,” Ollivander said. He floated the cup down to the table, and handed the wand back to Harry.

“I’ve only bought what I wanted for what I was working on,” Harry said, shrugging. “I’ve never actually combined cores in a wand, just experimented.”

“Well no, of course not,” Ollivander said, slightly scandalised. “Each core has its own properties and own strengths for the caster. Should you combine them, you’ll pit the cores against each other.”

“But what if it made them work together?” Harry asked. Ollivander looked sceptical and Harry shook his head. “All three cores that you use are distinct and established enough that they don’t pair well together. But thestral hair– “

“–Never to be used in my shop,” Ollivander said, sipping the water.

“Might work,” Harry stubbornly said. “Thestral hair is said to be unstable, but maybe it would be balanced with unicorn hair and its tendency to produce consistent magic. Or with a phoenix feather, for the range and control.”

Ollivander looked dubious.

“I don’t think it would work well with dragon heart string,” Harry admitted. “Too combative and the heartstring would take to dark magic too easily.”

“You have considered this greatly,” Ollivander said. He summoned the familiar tea set over, and gave Harry the same cup he’d used the last time. “Have you made a wand with thestral hair?”

“No,” Harry said, shaking his head. “But I’m considering it.”

“And who will you give this wand to?”

“I don’t have a client for it,” Harry evasively said. “Luna gave me the thestral hair.”

“Yes, yes, that’s right,” Ollivander said. He regarded Harry carefully, and Harry could tell that Ollivander didn’t fully believe him.

Instead of saying more though, Ollivander picked up a sheaf of paper from beside the tray. It was long and had very neat scripted writing on it, and Harry immediately knew he’d want a second pair of eyes to read it over.

“This contract is a trial period,” Ollivander started, laying the paper out in front of them both.

“It states that you will work out of my shop, with access to the same clients and shop space. It provides materials at the same purchasing discount that I receive, and that a percentage of your charged repair fees will be paid to me.”

Harry nodded. It sounded fair to him, but he’d definitely need time to read over the paperwork itself.

“Window advertising is of course included,” Ollivander added.

“I don’t expect there to be a large steam of clients,” Harry said, drinking his tea. “It does seem like buying new is the standard practise.”

“Yes, however let’s not be delicate about the reality, Mr Potter,” Ollivander said. “You are a celebrity, and there will be interest based solely on your name.”

“Which you will benefit from,” Harry pointed out.

“Of course,” Ollivander agreed. “And the contract is written to be as beneficial to both parties given all factors. Read it over at your leisure.”

“Thanks,” Harry said, finishing his tea. “I look forward to it, and learning more about wands. I’ve read a few of your books, but It’s not quite the same as learning in person.”

“It is long hours working with delicate shapes and shavings of wood,” Ollivander said and he had a quiet pride to his tone.

“It sounds really relaxing, to be honest,” Harry said. He stood up and put his scarf back on, before rolling up the contract.

“An unusual profession for the hero of the war,” Ollivander said.

“That chapter’s done,” Harry easily said. “On to the next. Happy new year, Mr Ollivander.”

“Garrick,” Ollivander said, holding his hand out to shake.

“Harry,” Harry replied, feeling positive for the first time that day.

….

Harry leaned against his kitchen worktop and idly licked curry off a spoon as he waited for the rest of the leftovers to reheat in the oven. He had another letter in his hand and skimmed it at first, re-reading again when he determined it wasn’t a rude one.

_“Harry! What news mate. Pretty brave and a little mad to come out in a magazine, but I support you. We should meet up for drinks some time. All the Gryffindor lads. – Dean.”_

He moved back to the living room, where the pile of letters had at least stopped growing. He wondered what Snape thought of it all; if he’d even be surprised at the reaction. Likely not, Snape had warned him more than a few times about what was coming.

At least no one had sent him a curse in the mail.

Maybe he would be fortunate enough that there would just be these grumblings, and no real issues, and he could get on with things. People would likely still stare at him in the streets, but that was certainly something he was already accustomed to. Seven years in the magical world and he’d never really had any time yet in which he wasn’t the focus of people. Or at least in their peripheral view.

When he was younger, he used to worry that he wouldn’t live up to what the magical world thought of him. As it was New Year’s Day, Harry decided that he’d make it his resolution to be unapologetic for who he really was.

There was a pad of paper on the coffee table and Harry started writing on it.

Freak. Boy. Orphan. Useless. Potty. Scarhead. Roonil Wazlib. The Boy Who Lived. Champion. The Chosen One. Undesirable Number 1. The War Hero.

Gay man.

Harry circled the last one. He didn’t really like any of the nicknames he’d been given growing up. The Boy Who Lived wasn’t terrible, but it had built him up to be a huge public figure of reverence, one with big expectations and no real way to step down. And that was the problem, wasn’t it? Some expected him to lead the aurors against bad wizards, some expected him to teach. He was watched with curiosity. And he knew that, that’s why he’d done his article. Jump ahead of the rumours and the speculation.

He opened another letter, reading it with trepidation.

_“I don’t know why you think this is relevant to anything, Potter. Congratulations on winning the war, once again, but keep these personal details to yourself. No one wants to think of these disgusting acts.”_

Harry sighed and turned round on the couch, picking up the picture frame of his parents that was on the credenza. He didn’t have a lot of photos of them, but really liked the joyous photo of them dancing and smiling together.

“I wish you could see me now,” Harry said. “I’ve been hired at Ollivander’s. I’m going to be a wandmaker. I just have to get over this stupid thing.”

He felt his eyes sting, and took his glasses off. The small wetness in the corner of his eyes wiped away easily. “I didn’t do the right thing, did I? This was a mistake.”

Harry looked up again a second later, hearing some noise that he thought was another owl. It wasn’t, so he shoved the letters into a bag to be forgotten for another day.

He knew he could probably find something stupid to watch on television. He considered seeing if Alice was around, but she’d get suspicious and want to know more details of what he was upset about.

Harry sighed and got up to get his curry from the oven. Maybe he’d send Neville an owl and ask what he was up to. Ron and Hermione were busy with Hermione’s parents, and Harry didn’t want to bother them.

He could send Snape a note…Harry put his curry down on the coffee table and went to get the potion recipe card from his desk. The first line of the recipe was empty, as always, and Harry tapped his pen against his chin as he thought of what to write. He didn’t want to whinge, as he knew Snape wouldn’t have much sympathy, and Harry wanted Snape to think of him as an adult who could solve his own problems.

 _Official wand-maker now_ , Harry finally scribbled on the card. It would only disappear once Snape had seen and acknowledged it, so Harry pinned the card back to the board where he’d be able to notice it from the couch.

It wasn’t that late in the day, and Harry was feeling a restless energy that he didn’t like. He could work on another wand, but felt like in this state he was more likely to stab himself with a chisel. It felt like he’d just discovered something at school and was waiting for nightfall before taking action. It reminded him of when he and Ron had decided to go into the Chamber of Secrets to rescue Ginny, when they were terrified twelve-year-olds dreading what they were going to face.

A knock on the door broke him out of his thoughts, and it opened before Harry could say anything.

“Hello!”

“Mrs Weasley?” Harry said, his head popping up from the couch. She gave him a warm smile from the door.

“Hello dear,” she said, shaking her gloves off. “I can’t stay too long, Arthur’s fiddling with some muggle electric things and I don’t like to leave him, of course.”

“Right,” Harry nodded, still confused as to why she was visiting, but pleased to see her. She was looking at him expectantly, and Harry was scrambling to remember if he’d missed an appointment.

“Yes, so bring your things. I thought you might like to come for a cup of tea.”

“Oh, I … yeah, that’d be nice,” Harry said. He stood up and looked at the curry bowl, before banishing it to the kitchen. She’d said to bring his things, but Harry didn’t really know what that would be.

“Your contract, Harry,” Molly gently said. “Arthur and I can have a look at it.”

“Yes,” Harry said, grabbing it from the table. He still felt a little off kilter, but it was a better feeling than his restlessness and so he followed her to the door. Harry turned back to check the potion card, and in the process, caught a glimpse of Fred in the portrait, giving his mother a salute.

….

_You’ll regret coming back, you deviant halfblood._

Arthur held the letter up to the kitchen light and squinted at it.

“Have you had more like these?”

“No,” Harry said. “Well yeah. But the others have been more generic in telling me that they don’t like what I am, or that it’s disgusting. This seems more like a threat.”

The owl that had delivered it hadn’t stayed long, but was easily identified as a Diagon Alley owl post. The letter had no markings to it, and Harry was concerned, but not as much as he would have been had he received it in his own flat. He knew that there were likely one or two Death Eaters left, but it somehow felt different than the year before. It was very different being back in a world where he wasn’t Undesirable Number 1.

“We should probably let Kingsley know,” Molly said. She stood up from the table, taking Harry’s empty cup as she went.

“It’s probably nothing,” Harry said. A threat, certainly, but nothing to the effect of what Voldemort had put him through over the last seven years of his life. He’d be careful, he didn’t think that he would ever be naïve enough to not be.

“Most likely,” Arthur agreed. “But good to share, just in case.”

Harry nodded. He’d been there for an hour already, and they’d discussed his contract at great detail. Arthur though it very standard, though he gave Harry some pointers on what to expect with wizarding taxes and employment. Molly had just told him how proud she was of him.

“Now, just between you and me,” Arthur said, keeping his voice low. Molly had dropped the cup off in the kitchen and gone upstairs to the bathroom, but Harry knew her hearing was particularly good.

“I want to nip this in the bud now. Once people find out about your involvement with Severus, I fear the violence may escalate.”

“My…what?” Harry asked. It was bad enough that Arthur had known about Harry’s homosexuality without him realising, but that he knew about Severus as well? How was it possible?

“I have six boys,” Arthur said, with a smile. “Molly isn’t the only one to notice things.”

“I didn’t think I was that obvious,” Harry said, feeling his face heat.

They heard movement above, and Harry knew Molly would be back shortly.

“You weren’t,” Arthur said, calmly folding the note back up. Maddeningly, he still didn’t explain how he’d figured it out. “But keep the letters and we’ll report them to the aurors. It may escalate.”

Harry nodded, still not sure what to say about Arthur’s revelation.

“You’ll have to explain how these portable telephony things work to me later, Harry,” Arthur said, just as Molly rounded the corner of the stairs.

“Oh no, you mustn’t,” Molly said. “No more muggle things, Arthur! Our house is full.”

“They’re small, Molly,” Arthur said, holding his hand up and making a c shape with his fingers. He was not really close to the size of any mobile phones that Harry had seen recently, and Harry smiled.

“Thanks for inviting me over,” Harry said, suddenly feeling quite warm and cared for. “I thought Ron would be back by now, but this has been nice even without him.”

“Harry dear,” Molly said, shaking her head at him. “Why ever would you think you weren’t welcome if Ron wasn’t here?”

….

_January 1, 1998_

“And are we waking up full of regrets this morning?”

Harry lifted his head and blearily looked at Snape, who was leaning against the back wall of the bed and holding his book. He was blurry, as Harry didn’t have his glasses on, but Harry felt that softened some of the glares.

“Were you expecting me to?” Harry asked. He rolled over and stretched, the blanket pulling down a bit and exposing his bare chest.

“Yes,” Snape frankly said. Harry could tell that he had Snape’s rapt attention.

“No, is the answer,” Harry said. “I had a great sleep actually. We should do more training today.”

Though Snape was still rather blurry, Harry was certain he was getting a look that conveyed Snape’s doubt about that.

“And I’d like to do it again, just so you know,” Harry said, putting his glasses on.

“I would think that you’d have time to refle…”

“Do you want to fuck again?” Harry interrupted, sitting up. “Sex isn’t the only thing I want, but this is hardly the situation to judge whether that’d be a good idea.”

“And if we survive, more later?” Snape asked, his voice thick with sarcasm.

“Something like that,” Harry said. He struggled to get out of bed with how weak his arm was, but managed it with some dignity. Snape had clearly been up for a while, and had made coffee, which drew Harry over to the worktop.

He poured a cup, standing at the sink in nothing more than his boxer briefs.

“You mentioned yesterday that you had the sword of Gryffindor?” Harry asked.

….

Snape was surprisingly graceful as he avoided Harry’s map on the floor, and the little representational pieces that Harry had made out of random clutter from the bothy. He was doing the washing up, as Harry pushed things around and figured out alternate routes of attack.

“You own a Hallow,” Snape said, not turning to look at Harry.

“Yes. If they’re real,” Harry said, plopping the white sliver of soap and piece of black shoestring (Voldemort and Nagini, respectively) into the area marked as the forest. He had a feeling that he’d be back in the forest, at some point.

“But I’m focusing on the horcruxes.”

“I have no further information,” Snape said, dunking Harry’s mug in the water. “Dumbledore was very selective with what he shared and when.”

“Probably for a good reason,” Harry said, scowling at his written notes. He’d had to write with his left hand, and it was quite frankly terrible looking. “Though I doubt that he ever envisioned you and I meeting in a secret bothy to discuss war tactics.”

Snape stayed quiet, and Harry smiled to himself.

“Or other things.”

Whatever Snape was washing slipped a little and dropped in the sink.

“I find it hard to believe that the….”

“No,” Harry firmly said. “I am not the son of anyone, as far as this is concerned. I didn’t grow up knowing them, and I’m not going to be used as some weird revenge plot.”

Snape glanced down at him and looked annoyed but Harry cut him off.

“I’m interested in more, but if all you’re going to do is think of my father and some weird twisted relation to that situation, you can fuck off and we’ll never speak of this again.”

“This has nothing to do with your father,” Snape snapped. “Of course you’re nothing like him.”

“Then why do you always say I am?!”

“Use your brain, Potter! How would it look if I went around complimenting you?” Snape argued.

“Complimenting?” Harry asked, raising his eyebrow. He knew a small grin was growing on his face, but Snape was still facing the sink and couldn’t see it. “Have you ever actually given a compliment in your life?”

“I believe I gave words of appreciation last night,” Snape retorted, turning and pointing his finger at Harry.

“Yeah,” Harry agreed, full on grinning. “You certainly did. We should do that again.”

He swept the bits of clutter from the map and awkwardly stood up from the floor.

Snape leaned against the worktop, a tent forming in his pyjama trousers as he regarded Harry.

“You’re sorely mistaken if you think I’m going to only be submissive.”

“What?” Harry asked, stepping closer. “That isn’t exactly a trait I associate with you.”

Snape tried to cross his arms, but didn’t quite get the effect he wanted as he had to lift his right up because it wouldn’t move quite how he wanted. It didn’t stop Harry at all.

“I got what I wanted last night,” Snape said. He remained leaning against the worktop as Harry approached, seemingly unbothered that his erection was noticeable. “But if you think that for the remainder of our time in the bothy that I will be the submissive one, you are quite mistaken.”

His eyes were sharp as he glared at Harry, and Harry was more than a little turned on by the intensity.

“Is this more famous Harry Potter rubbish? The idea that he wants to be the winner in everything?” Harry asked. He was less than a foot away from Snape, his own erection close to touching Snape. “Because I would have thought you’d realised by now that I’m not him.”

His hands grabbed Snape’s hips, the right struggling to grip as strongly as he’d like. By the slight jump though, Harry knew he had both Snape’s attention and interest.

“Don’t be stupid. You _are_ him,” Snape said, the sharpness in his voice softening ever so slightly. He was still staring, watching to see what Harry would do next.

“I’m not who you think he is,” Harry said, slipping his left hand under the elastic waist band. Snape’s cock was hot and swollen, straining against the flimsy fabric. The skin felt velvety and Harry kept a strong grip as he slowly stroked. “Not some arrogant arsehole who doesn’t care about fairness or other people.”

Snape grunted as he started moving his hips with Harry’s strokes. He lost concentration on keeping his injured arm crossed and it swung down and almost dislodged Harry’s. Harry squeezed extra tight on the next stroke, his palm sticky with pre-cum from the head of Snape’s dick.

“Not some selfish gay man who won’t reciprocate,” Harry finished, as he sunk to his knees, dragging Snape’s trousers down with him. Snape’s dick was thicker than Harry expected, but he was grateful it wasn’t too long that he couldn’t fit most of it in his mouth. 

He’d never given a blow job before, but dreamt about it. The salty flavour wasn’t unexpected, but Harry knew it’d take him a bit to get used to it. He knew he wasn’t great, holding the base of Snape’s cock and sucking down as much as he could, in and out. Snape’s hands had immediately gone to Harry’s head, keeping him where he was but not pushing or choking him.

He was careful to keep his teeth from causing Snape any pain, but quickly felt that the blow job was getting a bit sloppy. Snape didn’t seem to care, and when Harry reached up to fondle his balls, Snape _moaned_. Harry groaned around Snape’s dick, feeling his own cock aching to be touched. He ran his tongue flat on the underside of Snape’s cock, before sucking hard as he pulled most of his mouth off like a lolly. Harry’s hands continued in sync with his mouth, the right just able to keep Snape’s cock steady, but the left moving slowly back, circling and then pressing against Snape’s arsehole.

“Ugn,” Snape said, pushing Harry’s head away after one final thrust. He pointed himself upward and came shortly after, come oozing out and getting on his shirt.

“Didn’t want me to swallow?” Harry asked, raising his eyebrows.

Snape didn’t answer, but instead gripped his collar and pulled Harry’s shirt up with urgency that made Harry quickly stand. He wasn’t expecting the ferocity of Snape’s kiss, nor to be spun around so that he was the one leaning back, where Snape had been standing seconds earlier.

“What,” Harry got out, before Snape disappeared and Harry’s trousers were yanked down. Unlike Harry, Snape knew what he was doing and deep throated Harry’s cock in one go.

“Fuccccck,” Harry hissed, his hips automatically snapping forward. He ran his fingers through Snape’s hair, his hands trying to part the long hair so he could see Snape’s face, see his dick in Snape’s mouth. Harry had been close as the giver, and now he felt like he had little control over when he was going to come, especially with how Snape’s tongue was swirling around his cockhead.

“You’d,” Harry got out, before he looked down and saw Snape’s piercing dark eyes looking right back up at him. He came hard, keeping upright only because Snape was holding him against the kitchen cabinets. He’d tried to give sufficient warning, and had thought for a microsecond about pulling out before he came. Snape’s grip was strong and unyielding though and he swallowed every last drop, keeping eye contact and showing Harry exactly how he liked to mix the dominant and submissive stereotypes of sex.

“Someday,” Harry said, panting a little as he caught his breath. “I’d like to try this in a bed.”


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A note on dates, it is the new year now in the story, so January 1998 is in the past, and January 1999 is the present. Also I don't know if content warnings for swearing is necessary, but there is a lot in this chapter.

_January 2 nd, 1999_

Harry patted his pockets as he walked around his flat, glancing at every surface. He’d never been the neatest person; his aunt had had many things to say to him about the state of his bedroom after he’d gone with Dumbledore to find Slughorn. But he usually knew where his wallet was…. Finally spotting it, Harry shoved it in his pocket, threw on a scarf, and tripped out the door.

He’d gone out a few times since the article had been released, getting a little less wary each time. The staring hadn’t stopped, but no one was shouting at him either. Because he was so close to the Leaky though, it didn’t really matter this time.

They’d snagged a table in the middle of the Leaky, Seamus bellowing his name as soon as he’d stepped through the back door. It was a long table, similar to those at the Hogwarts Great Hall, and Harry took a spot in the middle next to Ron.

“Butter beer or regular beer?” Dean asked. Both were on the table, and it appeared that they’d ordered enough for two or three pints a person.

“Butterbeer first,” Harry said, grabbing his glass. It was warm and cheery in the Leaky, and Harry was happy to sit down with his friends and relax, for the first time without fear of Voldemort on the back of his mind.

“How’s it been, Harry?” Neville asked. He had a plate of pasties in front of him, which seemed to be shared with everyone at the table.

“All right,” Harry said, with a shrug. “A busy few weeks.”

“No kidding,” Dean said. “You don’t do things by half.”

Harry grinned, taking another gulp of butterbeer. “I’m trying to get used to boring.”

“Well, we’re not here to celebrate that,” Ron said. He held up his pint and the rest of the table joined.

Harry held his own up, his face starting to turn red. Ron hadn’t said the exact reason they were meeting up, and Harry really hoped it wasn’t because of him coming out.

“To Harry! Who finally got a fecking job,” Seamus said, holding up his pint.

“What do you mean finally?” Harry laughed, with a bit of relief.

“Yeah, you lazy bastard,” Ron said, clinking Seamus’s glass.

“It’s been seven months,” Dean said, grinning.

“Eight,” Neville corrected.

“Yeah, eight. We were beginning to think you peaked at killing You know Who,” Dean finished.

“You’re all tossers,” Harry said, gesturing around the table with his glass in hand. “Every last one of you.”

“Course we are,” Ron said, stretching and bumping Harry’s shoulder. “Go on then, tell’em about your job.”

The din of the Leaky was just enough that their conversation was mostly quiet, and other than a few people glancing over at the group of them, Harry felt like this was normality restored. He took a breath, noting that his friends were watching him with real interest, and felt encouraged by that. He knew that wand lore was considered boring by most younger witches and wizards, but he’d become fascinated by it.

“You all remember Ollivander telling us that the wand chooses the wizard?” Harry asked, pulling his own wand out of his pocket. “It’s true, and the wand works best when it’s properly matched – core and wood – with its owner.”

He had their rapt attention and Harry felt like he was back in the DA, sharing his knowledge.

“People change though. Sometimes naturally, sometimes after a big or traumatic event. Their wands lose some of their power, because the wizard they matched with isn’t the same anymore.”

He turned his wand over and pointed out the walnut he’d added to his.

“What I do is look for something to add or to change, to make the match a good one again.”

“Huh,” Seamus said. “So, you’re saying if our wands aren’t working perfectly, you can add some wood and fix them.”

“Sort of,” Harry said. “It’s a bit more nuanced than not working perfectly.”

“Seamus just wants to know if you can make things stop exploding so much around him,” Dean laughed.

“Piss off,” Seamus said, grinning. “Came in handy during the battle, didn’t it?”

Dean threw a piece of sausage roll at Seamus, rolling his eyes.

“When do you start, Harry?” Neville asked.

“Next week,” Harry said. “There’ll be a little sign in the window, that’s all. I’m not doing a grand opening or anything.”

“Yeah, I’m sure people won’t notice the Chosen One opening a wand repair business,” Ron laughed.

Conversation flowed pretty well after that, Harry learning what his friends had been up to over the months that he’d been away. He didn’t regret leaving; it had been good for his mental well-being to be away from the accolades and the fall out of the battle. He couldn’t help feeling a bit that he’d missed out on some things though. Harry shook his head a bit and grabbed another beer. There was no use moping about it now, and he pushed it aside to enjoy the evening.

The chatter turned to university prospects, and then on to quidditch teams and how the English league was starting back up again. Harry didn’t say much, as it had been a while since he’d had the time to follow any of the teams. He did look up during one of Dean’s rants about Wimbourne and how they’d traded a very important player, and saw a younger witch passing through the Leaky staring at him. She had short hair and a muggle canvas rucksack slung across her shoulder, with a pierced nose. She raised her fist up at him and nodded, passing by a table of older witches and wizards on the way to the gate for Diagon Alley.

“Do you know her?” Neville asked, nodding toward the witch that had disappeared.

“I don’t,” Harry said, shaking his head. But he’d seen that raised fist before, done it himself, on demonstrative walks with Alice and Luke in muggle London. Protesting Section 28, protesting for trans rights. And he knew what it meant. There _were_ other non-straight witches and wizards in the magical world, and at least one had read his article, and made herself known.

……

“Harry, tell me this,” Dean said, his elbow on the table and beer glass in his hand, that he pointed in Harry’s general direction. “How long have you known? About the gay thing?”

They’d been drinking and chatting for a while by then, and Harry had expected the questioning.

“For a few years,” Harry said. He’d been drinking slower, as had Neville, and was patient as he waited for Dean’s next question.

“I thought you went out with Cho though.”

“And my sister,” Ron pointed out. Harry shrugged.

“Yeah, well you suspect, and then you deny it, and then you wonder again, and then you admit it,” Harry said. “Then you wonder how homophobic people will be, and if you should tell anyone at all.”

“Well, we don’t care,” Seamus said, nodding at Harry with authority.

“Are you dating anyone, Harry?” Neville asked, picking at the pasty crumbs on the plate. They’d gone through the whole plate, and had shared a platter of meats, cheeses, and potato wedges as well.

“Yeah,” Seamus hiccupped. “You have a boyfriend now?”

“Nah, I had one,” Harry said, “in the muggle world.”

“No one now?” Ron asked, narrowing his eyes. Harry kicked him under the table.

“Guess there’s not a lot of ‘em,” Seamus said. “Gay wizards.”

“I don’t know any others,” Dean agreed.

“You’d be surprised,” Harry evasively said.

……

_January 4 th, 1999_

“That was such a ridiculous film,” Alice said, bumping into Harry a little as she walked. There was an event going on at Borough Market, and she expertly led him through the crowd of business-casual celebrants. She’d had a glass of wine, but Harry hadn’t felt much like drinking.

“You have the worst taste in them,” Harry said. “Really. Do you just pick based on what actor you think looks good?”

“Of course,” Alice said. The sounds of the market event dimmed as they rounded the corner toward Alice’s street. It was a dark, drizzly night in January, and Harry wasn’t surprised to find the streets mostly deserted.

“Sometimes you have to go for the eye candy,” Alice said.

“I like to think I’m not that superficial,” Harry sardonically said. 

He suddenly shot forward, stumbling, his right arm burning in pain as his body stiffened. 

“What, Harry!” Alice said, leaning forward to help him. The cruciatus curse was weak though, and Harry was able to fight it off almost immediately. He spun and had his wand drawn within seconds, not caring that Alice could see it.

“Protego!” Harry cast, protecting them both. Alice froze beside him, but Harry couldn’t tell if it was because of the surprise or the sight of his wand.

“I can’t believe you’re the one they call the hero,” a male voice said, standing only fifteen feet away. There were two of them, and though Harry immediately recognized Draco Malfoy, it took him a little longer to place the second.

“The war’s over,” Harry said, trying to grip his wand tightly. His nerves were burning, and he knew he’d have to switch hands soon. “Let it go.”

“I’m not going to fucking let it go,” the second one spat on the floor. His hair draped forward a bit, and Harry realized who he was. Theodore Nott. “You’ve got some nerve, coming back to our world, prancing around like an inferior halfblood pansy.”

“I don’t prance, Nott,” Harry said. He noticed that both Malfoy and Nott had their wands out, but he wasn’t sure who’d cast the cruciatus.

Alice stepped a bit closer to Harry, and muttered _what the fuck_ under her breath.

“But you are inferior,” Nott said. “You all are, and here’s proof. You can’t even fuck right.”

Alice, baffled as to what was going on but sensing that there was danger, stiffened at the last statement. Harry knew she was a fighter though, and stepped in front of her to prevent her from going after them.

Nott took advantage of Harry’s movement to cast another spell, but Harry easily blocked it. His arm was seizing on him but he managed to get off a stinging hex.

“A stinging hex?” Malfoy sneered. “What are you, twelve? We’re going to destroy you, Scarhead. We’re going to run you out of Diagon Alley. Nobody wants a bent bastard making wands for them, and after what you did to my father, I’ll make sure you’re ruined.”

“You’ll ruin me?” Harry challenged, still keeping his wand focused. “When’s the last time you showed your faces at the Ministry, _Malfoy_? Nott? Who’s the one with the bad reputation exactly?”

“You think I care about the Ministry?” Nott asked, firing another quick spell at Harry. Harry blocked it with a grunt, and switched to his left hand. “You and your fucking sob stories, but you don’t care about making other people into orphans.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Harry asked.

“Yeah,” Alice demanded, standing taller and puffing her chest out a bit. She was a little taller than Harry, and he appreciated the support, but she was absolutely not intimidating to either Malfoy or Nott.

“Godric’s Hollow, you cunt,” Nott said, spittle punctuating his words.

“You killed our fathers,” Malfoy said, pointing his own wand at Harry. Harry noted that it was a different wood type than his last one. “And we’re going to enjoy destroying you.”

“If you even live that long,” Nott said, stepping closer. Malfoy grabbed his arm and stopped him.

“We can’t actually kill him,” Malfoy hissed, but his words were lost in a flurry of spells that Nott cast.

Harry felt a rush of adrenalin as he waved his wand back and forth like he was weaving threads in the air. It was _easy_ ; he felt power flowing through his left arm and out to his wand, casting aside their hexes and sending his own back in a fluid motion. He easily protected Alice from being hit by either magic or debris, and created a swirl of rubble from the street and part of the brick wall beside them that rippled through the air and shot at Malfoy and Nott.

“Are you done?” Harry shouted, above the roar of the brick that had surrounded them, but weren’t battering them.

“Harry,” Alice said, her voice almost a warning.

They couldn’t fight their way out of his spell, and he could tell that they were trying their best to. Harry knew he had to end it before they became suspicious, before they realised that he still had it. That he was still the master of the Elder wand.

He killed the tornado of debris with a slash, and stared at them, their hair wild and both panting, like Harry was.

“Cruci–“

“IMMOBILUS!” Harry cast, powerful enough to freeze both of them at once. They leaned awkwardly against the wall, and only their eyes moved as Harry approached.

He walked over with a grim expression, knowing that Alice was likely terrified and liable to run soon. His arm was making it hard to concentrate, but he tried to hide it as he still didn’t want his weakness known.

“The Headmaster was right,” Harry said, his right arm absolutely searing with pain as he held Nott at wand point against the wall. “Malfoy can’t kill anyone, and neither can you. You have to really mean it, Nott, and I don’t think you do.”

Harry let him go, and Nott teetered over like a bowling ball pin. With a quick flick of his wand, Harry slid Malfoy over beside Nott, and stared down at the two of them.

“I could break your nose,” Harry said, watching the aggravation and trepidation in their eyes. “Stomp on your face, right here and now. But that’d be a bitch move, wouldn’t it, _Draco_?”

Harry could feel the anger building again, and stepped back from them before he actually did it. The war was over, and though they’d tried to hurt him, he refused to stoop to that level. Instead, he held their wands up where they were visible in the streetlight, and snapped them in half.

Harry turned and grabbed Alice’s hand before she could react, and apparated them to the stairs of his flat.

“Jesus fuck,” Alice said, her hand gripping his as if she was about to fall off a cliff. “Where are we? What the bloody hell was that?”

Harry shook his head and pulled her upstairs, not even bothering hiding his spells. The door opened as soon as they got to the stairs and the fireplace sprung to life as they entered.

“Two ex-school mates,” Harry said, walking over to his desk. He knew he’d have to explain to Alice, but needed to get a note written first. He hoped his message on the potion card was legible.

“Who really hate me,” Harry said, turning back around. Alice was still at the door, staring wide eyed at Harry.

“Enough to fight you or whatever that was?” she asked. “What did I… what did I just see, Harry? Because I don’t believe it.”

She sounded a bit afraid, but Harry hoped she’d give him a chance to explain.

“And why the _fuck_ are there owls staring at you?”

Harry glanced at the window and noticed two owls waiting for him. He sighed, and went to get his _Evening Prophet_ delivery and whatever note had been sent. As he passed by his desk, he knocked on Fred’s portrait.

“Sit down, and I’ll tell you.”

Harry figured she’d need either a cup of tea, or some firewhiskey, so he brought both out from the kitchen and sat down on the chair opposite from her. She was at least sitting on the couch, but was nervous and looking around as if there was a chance that anything from his flat might jump out at any moment and attack.

“It’s regular tea,” Harry said, nodding to the cup he’d put on the table. He gave her a second to sip it, and worked on gingerly removing his jumper. The cruciatus, as short as it had been, had turned his damaged nerves into hot searing pins and needles all up and down his arm. He needed to get all fabric off it, and needed to either dunk it in ice or do something to kill the feeling.

“What?” Fred said, finally appearing in his frame. “This was not the intended use of…who’s that?”

“Alice,” Harry said, keeping his eye on his arm as he pulled the sleeve down. Harry knew he was making a pained face, but didn’t much care.

“Tell your dad he was right. Malfoy and Nott attacked. The aurors can pick them up near Borough Market.”

“Shite,” Fred said. “You all right?”

“Yeah, will be,” Harry said, as Fred nodded and sprinted out of the frame.

Alice was staring, mouth open.

“You've wanted to know what I was for months," Harry said, wiping the blood off of his arm from where the skin had broken on his wrist scar. "And I told you. But you laughed it off, as I thought you would."

“You’re a wizard,” Alice said, and Harry couldn’t tell if it was awe or fear in her voice.

Harry sat back in his chair, trying to flex his fingers to see if that would help at all. It made things exponentially worse, so he stopped immediately. His jumper was only partially off, but he needed to take a moment to breathe.

“We all are. Ron, Severus, me. Well, except for Hermione. She’s a witch.”

“A famous wizard who saved the world?” Alice quoted, her one eyebrow raised. Harry took the sarcasm as a good sign.

“Yes. We’re sworn to secrecy, there’s no way I could have told you. You may have noticed something was off over the past few years anyway. The terrible weather, the mysterious murders up and down the country. The Millennium bridge. It was all part of the war we just had.”

“A war. So, you _were_ a soldier. And how did I meet you, if it’s all supposed to be secret?”

Harry leaned forward and finally got his jumper off in one go, grunting as he did so.

“I left. I went to the muggle world, to get away for a while and figure out who I was.”

“The muggle world? What’s the muggle world? And this is why you were afraid to come out? Because you’re famous?” she sipped her tea again, and relaxed a little bit more into the couch.

“Non-magical people are called muggles,” Harry explained. “And yes. As you just saw, the reaction hasn’t all been positive.”

A knocking sound came from the fireplace and the fire whooshed green, just before Snape stepped out of it.

“I presume I am not the first to break the statute in front of your muggle friend this evening,” Snape said, looking down at his overcoat as he flicked ash off of it.

“Not exactly,” Harry said, his voice sounding a bit rougher. “Draco Malfoy and Theodore Nott found us in London.”

Snape looked less than amused at that, and strangely did not comment on how obviously Alice was staring at him.

“Did you just come through the fucking fire?” she blurted, staring at him.

“It does seem that way,” Snape said. He withdrew a small phial from his pocket as he walked toward Harry. “What was it?”

“Cruciatus,” Harry said, wincing as he offered up his right arm. Snape took it carefully and inspected, running his finger slightly up the scars on Harry’s forearm.

“How are you not burnt to a crisp? Where did you come from? The other side?”

Snape narrowed his eyes at the questions, and Harry answered instead.

“It’s a network of fireplaces. We don’t get burnt because of magic.”

“So, I wouldn’t either?” Alice said, still wary but also starting to get curious.

“I’ve never put a muggle through,” Snape said, drawing his wand out and holding it over Harry’s arm. “Should you like to try…”

“Severus,” Harry said, shaking his head. It was partially out of admonishment, and partially because he wanted to pull his arm back, to keep it tight against his body and protect it from any movement. It felt like the cruciatus had undone any healing his arm had done over the year from when it was first cursed.

Instead of saying anything else, Snape held his wand over Harry’s arm and started chanting a healing spell under his breath. Harry knew it wouldn’t solve everything, as they’d tried it when they’d first landed in the bothy, but he found it interesting that Snape’s spell wavered in how strong it was.

“What are you doing?” Alice asked, gripping her tea cup. Snape’s back was to her, but she could see his wand and that Harry’s arm was very red.

The knocking noise sounded again, and Alice whipped her gaze back to the fireplace.

“Harry, you all right?” Ron asked, landing almost gracefully in the fireplace grate. “Hermione’s coming.”

“Mostly,” Harry said. Only he could see Snape roll his eyes.

“Alice… hi,” Ron said, noticing her on the couch.

“She knows,” Harry grunted, closing his eyes as Snape’s wand passed over his wrist.

“She’d be an idiot not to notice,” Ron said. “What happened?”

“They hit him with some magic,” Alice said, when Harry didn’t respond. “And he did some back, and left them sort of frozen. There was a lot of shit flying everywhere.”

“Who’s they? You mean on the muggle side?” Ron asked. Snape continued to chant, but his voice was low and melodious and didn’t overpower the conversation.

“Malfoy and Nott knew I was back because of the article,” Harry said. “I don’t know how they knew I was there.”

“Drink this,” Snape said, holding up the phial to Harry’s mouth. “Nott’s family have house elves, of which I believe you’re aware of their ability to find people unnoticed.”

“Wonderful,” Harry monotoned. “Betrayed by house elves.” He pulled his arm back into his chest and Snape flicked his wand, using the same spell they’d used in the bothy the year before to keep their arms still.

“Dad’s talking to Kingsley,” Ron said, sitting on the couch next to Alice and watching Harry with concern. “Told me to leave the aurors to find them.”

The front door opened quickly and Alice almost spilt her tea in surprise.

“Harry! Fred tol..Hi Alice.”

“She knows, Hermione,” Ron said, turning around to greet her.

“Oh, right,” Hermione said. “How is he, Severus?”

Snape looked like he still wasn’t sure how he felt about Hermione using his first name, and that he definitely did not appreciate being treated as Harry’s nursemaid.

“Why don’t you ask him?” Snape dryly asked.

“Because he downplays it,” Hermione said, with a guilty smile.

“No, I don’t,” Harry argued. Snape put his hand on Harry’s thigh, close to his knee, and squeezed it.

“I will return. There is more salve in my lab,” Snape said, standing up straight and looking slightly uncomfortable with the conversation. He gave Harry a one-over, as if checking to see if Harry had neglected to mention any other injuries. 

“Thanks,” Harry said, looking up at Snape and keeping eye contact for a few seconds. Snape finally turned away and back to Harry’s fireplace. He pinched the powder from Harry’s little jar on the mantel, and disappeared into the green flames.

“Wait, but we left them there,” Alice said, shaking her head. “And they were going to kill you. You left them near my flat, shouldn’t someone go get them?”

“They what, mate?” Ron asked, glaring at Harry.

“It was Malfoy, Ron. They should be easy to find though, I doubt they got far.”

“How so?” Alice asked, putting her now empty cup down. “Apparently you lot can travel through fireplaces, and whatever the fuck we did to get here.”

“Yeah, but I snapped their wands,” Harry said, with a grim smile. “It’ll take them a bit to get back.”

“Can’t they just get new ones?” Alice asked.

“Not easily. I work for the only shop in our part of London that makes them.”

“Harry, isn’t that punishable by law?” Hermione asked.

“Nah,” Ron said. “Nothing stopping someone from buying another. Kind of funny to think of Malfoy riding the roll thingy to get home though.”

“The tube?” Harry asked, with a small smirk. He was feeling chilly and tried to see if he could drape the jumper over himself without aggravating his arm.

“Wait,” Alice said. “… _to the foolish boy who loves his sticks_. I wrote that to you because you left those things all over Luke’s flat. Were those wands?”

“Parts of them,” Harry said, tucking the sleeve of the jumper over his shoulder.

A bright light grew larger in the window, a small ball of glowing white-blue as it approached the glass, capturing their attention. It pushed through the glass without breaking it and circled around the room, before forming into Kingsley’s lynx patronus. Harry felt a split second of dread in his stomach, remembering the last patronus message they’d received from Kingsley.

“ _Detained. Stay in place, will discuss shortly_.”

“Wow,” Alice said. “What is that?”

“It’s a patronus,” Hermione answered. “The exact type of animal depends on the caster.”

“This one’s from the Minister for Magic,” Ron said, glancing at Harry and Hermione.

“What’s that mean?” Alice asked, looking between them.

“It means you probably shouldn’t be here when he gets here,” Hermione gently said.

Alice nodded and stood up.

“The secrecy thing, right. Well, the glowing lynx said they were arrested right, so I can go home safely?”

“Yes,” Harry quietly said. He didn’t want to be the one to mention the memory charm, because he knew it had to happen and he felt like it was a betrayal of their friendship.

“You have a faster way for me to get home?”

“Alice,” Harry started. He didn’t know how to say it, and glanced at Ron and Hermione.

“There’s a Statute of Secrecy that we have,” Hermione said, looking up at Alice.

“Oh. And you need to wipe my memory,” Alice finished. The silence that took over was heavy and harsh.

“Hermione’s really good at it,” Ron lamely offered.

“I’ll never see you again?” Alice asked, looking between them. Harry knew why she was worried; she was a tough and gruff person who liked to pretend that she was always fine. But she didn’t have a lot of actual friends.

“You will,” Harry reassured her. “But you won’t remember this. You won’t remember the magic.”

She nodded and then coughed to clear her throat.

“Is this why you broke it off with Luke?”

“It’s why I never wanted anything serious with Luke,” Harry clarified. “I also knew that there was still some danger, and that's not fair."

"Some danger,” she scoffed. “Listen, I’ve been kissing lads in the street for years. And there’s danger and violence to that. But this is on another level.”

“Magic can be wonderful, and fun, and helpful,” Harry said. “And I’d never give it up. But there’s bad witches and wizards as well, and they can do magic too.”

“Right,” Alice said, and it sounded like she was attempting nonchalance. “And I’m glad you’ll be okay, and that we’ll still be friends. I’m sure I’ll still think you’re a weird wanker, so that’s fine then.”

“We’ll still be your friends too,” Ron said, smiling. “Can’t miss board game night.”

She gave him a half-hearted smile back, but didn’t answer him.

“Alice…” Hermione finally said, holding her wand gingerly in her lap.

“Hermione,” Alice interrupted. “I have enough shit in my life that I don’t want to knowingly worry about someone attacking me for being near him. I can’t think about that all the time. And I think – I suspect – that you live in a world where you can fix people like me. Without trying for surgery, or therapy, or hormone drugs. And I’ll never have that. I don’t… I can’t remember any of it.”

Harry would never know what it was like to be trans, but he’d heard her talk about her challenges, and what surgeries were available and how they’d never quite be enough. There was no point in correcting the assumptions, in telling her that Polyjuice wouldn’t quite fix it either. Because she was right, and he knew from how much his Aunt had resented his mother that sometimes it was better to not remember that magic existed at all.

……

_January 5 th, 1998_

The door opened quietly, as if Snape wasn’t sure if Harry was awake or not. The muggle light in the kitchen was left on, and Snape, all in black and looking like the shadows he was standing in, appeared imposing and rather scary-looking in the door frame.

“Did he know?” Harry immediately asked. He’d been glancing out the bothy window for hours, failing to read even four pages of the book he’d picked up. The Dark Mark had burned hours ago, interrupting another argument about where the horcruxes would be found. They hadn’t talked about it, talked about being stuck and injured for so long over the Christmas holidays. About how Snape had a very visible role in the war, and that he’d likely be noticed missing more so than Harry.

Snape raised his eyebrow and looked up at Harry, but said nothing. He removed his boots with a spell and went right to the bathroom, closing the door quietly behind him.

Harry sprang out of bed, unsure of whether Snape was angry or injured, or just being Snape. He flipped the kettle on, figuring there was no harm if it wasn’t wanted.

Snape emerged from the washroom a few minutes later and he was dressed down, his slacks changed to pyjama trousers, he’d changed into a t-shirt, and was barefoot.

“Well?” Harry said. He could see the Dark Mark clearly, a rich black that looked embedded deep into Snape’s arm. The other arm was swollen, tree-branch scarring a fever red.

“No,” Snape said, pouring some hot water in a mug to drink on its own. “It was not a gathering of new year’s pleasantries and conversations.”

“Right,” Harry said, rolling his eyes. He tossed the book he was holding on to the coffee table and climbed back into bed. It was half twelve, and Harry didn’t normally stay up that late.

“You were, however, a topic of conversation,” Snape continued, finishing his water and putting the mug in the sink.

“Was I now,” Harry said, shaking out his blankets to cover his feet. “What a surprise.”

“He no longer believes that you are in hiding just to hide from him,” Snape warned, carefully climbing onto his side of the bed. “But rather that you are tasked with something. And I will be returning to the school soon.”

“Your arm isn’t fully healed,” Harry pointed out.

“I am well aware of that, Potter,” Snape said, turning in the bed and facing the wall. He was clearly in a bad mood, but Harry didn’t let up.

“So how are you going to hide it? If you get caught– “

“I am aware of the stakes!” Snape snapped. “This has been going on since you were in nappies.”

“Yeah, it has,” Harry snapped back. “And now it’s coming to an end, which is the most dangerous time for both of us.”

Snape grumbled, and Harry thought he heard a muttered “I fucking know that.”

He was curled over onto his side, blanket pulled up on top of his shoulder, in a defensive position.

“It is too dangerous to stay here for much longer,” Snape said. “We should have never gotten this close. This is a moment suspended in time, Potter, and it might backfire and undo all of Dumbledore’s planning.”

“Stop calling me Potter.”

“An anomaly of circumstance. This shouldn’t exist, and we need to go back to hatred for any chance of Dumbledore’s plan working,” Snape continued.

“Fuck hatred,” Harry said.

“Yes of course, says the rash …”

“Shut up, Severus,” Harry snapped. “This moment is happening, whether it’s suspended in time, an anomaly, or a twist of fate. And I know you’ve been at this for longer than I can imagine, and that you’re in danger every day _. I know that_. I don’t know what turned you against him, but I suspect Dumbledore was involved and quite frankly he’s shite at giving comfort when you really need it. So maybe this moment happened because it needed to.”

Snape turned over and gave Harry an incredulous look.

“What sort of trashy romance novel drivel is that?” Snape said. “You think that we’re stuck in this bothy together because after seventeen years of being a double agent some benevolent spirit decided that I need comfort from Harry fucking Potter?”

Harry flexed his fingers on his left hand, willing the urge to punch Snape to settle down.

“I think that maybe it is a moment of calm, before both of us face what is likely our final few months,” Harry evenly said. “You’ve told me the plan for how my story ends, but I also know that you don’t think you’ll survive.”

“My job will be done, _Harry_ ,” Snape said, black eyes glittering in the moon’s reflection through the window. “It matters not that I survive.”

“It matters to me,” Harry said, flopping down on his side of the bed. “Nox.”


End file.
